Denise Mina - The Dead Hour

“You got fingerprints off the note? And a match for them, a name for them, on the first day? Is Deep Blue working for you?”

He bit his bottom lip hard.

“So.” She found herself smiling. “Did they match the suspenders guy?”

“No. There’s two sets on it: one of them must be his, from when he handed it to you, but we don’t have him on file.”

“But you can use it for confirmation when you get him, can’t you?”

He looked past her.

She asked him a question he could answer. “Did the other set match prints from the house?”

“No, we didn’t get anything from inside the house.” He let his face split into a grin. “It was wiped, thoroughly cleaned.”

“But why did they go to all that trouble and not bother about the note?”

He raised his eyebrows and Paddy leaned in. “They thought I’d go out and spend it, didn’t they? They thought I’d break the note up.”

“The other set match a known name, a heavy, someone Mark Thillingly would never have gone with. Supports the idea that it wasn’t him after all.” Sullivan clasped his hands together, delighted with himself. “You can’t use any of that, obviously. Not yet.”

“You know I couldn’t even if I wanted to,” Paddy said, trying to think of a way she could use it. “The lawyers won’t let us print anything that could prejudice a trial.”

“Aye. We don’t want these people walking because you put their name in the paper before they get to court.”

“What sort of names would I be not putting in the paper?”

Sullivan leaned toward her and whispered a single word before pulling away. “Lafferty.”

Kate had been waiting in the car for what felt like months, sitting doubled over her knees with her eyes tightly shut as her eyes streamed and tried to flush the solid crystal from the mucous membrane. As she sat there she swore she would cut the powder with something. She should have brought the milk powder from the cottage but who thought of these things.

When she finally felt she could sit up she was refreshed and feeling sensible. She had dealt with a medical emergency calmly and on her own. Well done me, she thought, and started the engine, backing out of the space slowly across the empty car park and pulling out onto the road.

The restaurant belonged to Archie and although Archie wasn’t really her friend he had always made it clear that he liked her. He tried to grope her a couple of times, running his fat American hands over her backside when he thought they were alone in the back corridor. Sometimes he followed her to the toilet during late-night lock-ins and once she had let him touch her breast and kiss her neck before fighting him off. Archie liked her a lot.

She cruised slowly past the crescent of shops, saw the TUSKS WINE BAR sign and the bright window behind the lowered white blind. It was a wine bar really, but they did little dishes, tapas, small tastes of delicious food. She’d tried a couple of things and they seemed really very good. Chips and an egg thing. Lovely.

She passed the street nearby that they usually parked in before going to Archie’s. She found a space and was about to reverse into it when she remembered she was trying to sneak around. If she knew to look there for his car, he’d know to look there for her car. Well done me.

A sharpened pencil through a drum of paper. She shook her hand as if trying to fleck off mud. Nasty feeling. She drove around the corner and parked there, on a suburban road, tucking it in tightly behind a big van so that if he was driving past her car would be hidden.

She would have a dry white wine, large, cold, and a giggle with Archie. She might let him seduce her. He was old, wasn’t attractive but she might let him anyway. It had been days since she had even spoken to anyone else and a night with a kind friend would be nice.

Feeling slightly squeamish about it, she put her handbag over her shoulder and stepped out of the gorgeous car, locking it and trying the door handle out of habit, just to be sure. She brushed her blond hair roughly with her fingers, tucking it loosely behind her ear, and did up the gold buttons on her navy suit. As she walked along the road to Archie’s she became more aware of being seen and started to sway her hips, to roll her shoulders and pout a little. She’d have a drink with Archie, scout the place, see if she could leave the pillow there somewhere, and maybe let Archie have his way.

The heat was radiating through the glass of the large window. She remembered a hundred nights here, all conflated into one door being opened for her, one table heaving with the most expensive wines, and Archie pressing dishes on all the guys to complement the wines and enhance the experience.

She smiled along with all the guys as they laughed about something, a joke she was half-listening to, a pun about types of French mustard, and smirking smugly, pushed the door open, clip-clopping down the glazed terra-cotta stairs into the circle of tiles that marked the reception area.

The restaurant was only half-busy but every single person there dropped their cutlery and stared at the door. Puzzled, Kate smiled faintly and turned back to look over her shoulder. There was no one behind her. She turned back and realized that they were all staring at her, gawping, being very very rude.

She tutted and adjusted the strap on her handbag, moving it up her shoulder and looking around for Phillipe, Archie’s maître d’. She didn’t have to wait. Archie himself came straight out of the back room, barreling across the floor when he saw her.

Kate flung her arms up in a great big glorious greeting. “Hello, darling.”

Archie took hold of her wrist, twisting it so that it actually hurt a bit, and pulled her outside, almost dragging her up the three semicircular steps to the street. Her handbag slid down her arm, bumping heavily on the tiles.

Outside, Archie turned to her, pressing his face an inch from hers. “Go away. I never want to see you here again.”

She dipped her chin down and looked up at him coquettishly. “Don’t be a meanie, Archie, I’ve had a rotten couple of days.” She ran her finger down the buttons on his shirtfront. “Be nice to me.”

“He’s after you, you know that?”

“I know, I know, it’s a misunderstanding. He thinks I did a naughty but I’m only naughty in a good way.” She smiled up at him, hoping he would get the sexy hint and take her home with him, look after her. She didn’t care that he was old tonight. She didn’t care that hair grew wildly out of his nose and the neck of his shirt. She didn’t care that he only had a restaurant. She wanted to touch someone and be touched. She needed human contact and a place to go.

“Archie.” Her hand slid up his shirt to the shoulder. It was a cheap shirt, she could hear the nylon fibers letting off a rip-zip sound as her fingertips slid across it. “You like me a lot, don’t you?”

He put his hairy fingers over hers and peeled her hand off his chest. “You know, Kate, I don’t like you. I think you’re a vacant twat. But there was a time when I’d have fucked you.” He held up his finger, drawing her attention to the salient point. “See, that’s different. I’d have fucked you because you were with him. But now-” He flicked his finger up and down her. “Now, I wouldn’t let you pay to suck my dick.”

It was the rudest anyone had ever been to her. Kate stepped back and stared at him. He was fat and old and wore cheap shirts and had hair everywhere. She was the prettiest girl in her year, the best-looking woman at the Marina Club, the biggest prize at each and every ball she had ever attended. She made a face like a little fist, knowing it suited her, playing her best card, and swung an open hand at his great fat head.