Shatter the Bones

by Stuart MacBride

  ‘No I bloody wouldn’t. Three: we come up with some sort of cover story…’ Logan straightened.

  Ellen, the officer who’d given everyone a leg-up through the lounge window, lurched into the kitchen, face all pink and glistening. She puffed and panted her way across to the sink, set the cold tap running, and stuck her head under the stream of water. ‘Bloody hell…’

  Ferguson licked his teeth. ‘Did you…?’

  She turned, dripping all over the kitchen floor. ‘They should rope … rope him in … for the 2012 Olympics. If the bugger can … can run that fast handcuffed … to a rotary drier … he’ll walk the five hundred metres…’ She stuck her head back under the tap again. ‘Swear I watched him hurdle a … six foot fence like it … like it wasn’t even there.’

  ‘Oh God…’ Ferguson covered his face with a hand. ‘I’m screwed.’

  ‘Ellen?’ Logan fidgeted with the bag of frozen chips. ‘I think Greg here wants to ask you a favour.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Just make sure the pair of you’ve got your stories straight for Professional Standards, OK?’

  A knock at the kitchen door.

  It was Guthrie, clutching an assortment of white paper bags, most of them turned peek-a-boo with grease. ‘Wouldn’t believe how hard it is to find an all-night bakers in Kincorth.’ He handed a bag to Logan.

  ‘Bacon?’

  ‘Fried egg. Us veggies got to stick together, right?’

  Logan took a bite out of the soft, floury roll, getting a little dribble of yolk on his chin. ‘What about the ambulance?’

  ‘Out front. Got Billy Dawson in the back already, they say the other bloke just needs a couple of stitches.’ Guthrie helped himself to a flaky-pastry-log thing. Speaking with his mouth full, getting little chips of pale brown all down the front of his black uniform. ‘Social worker’s here too, Guv. Wants a word.’

  The social worker was in the lounge, poking through a twirly CD tower unit, her black hair streaked with grey: tweedy trousers, yellow shirt, red waistcoat straining over her belly … like something out of Wind in the Willows. She turned and sniffed at Logan. Then held out a clipboard. ‘I need you to sign.’

  He scanned the form, then scrawled his signature in the box with a cross marked beside it. ‘It’s a—’

  ‘Ooh, I’ve got this one.’ She pulled a copy of Annie Lennox’s Diva from the stand. ‘You ever meet her?’

  ‘Er, no. We—’

  ‘I was born in Torry, just like her. Even went to the same school: Harlaw Academy.’ The social worker turned the album over, frowning at the back. ‘Is Trisha still here, or have you carted her off?’

  ‘Trisha?’

  ‘Trisha Brown? The mother? Addict? Has a little boy about so high?’ She held a hand level with her own swollen belly.

  ‘Upstairs.’

  A nod. ‘I remember thinking, “When I grow up, I’m going to be that famous. Going to be on Top of the Pops and MTV and in all the papers.” Sang in a couple of bands, nearly got a record deal.’ She stuck the album back in the tower. ‘Then my dad died, my mum fell apart, and I had to get a job in Asda. Here endeth the pop star’s dream.’

  ‘We’re doing her for possession, resisting arrest, and assaulting a police officer.’

  The social worker took the clipboard back from Logan, squinted at his signature. ‘Loren McRoy? That not a girl’s name?’

  ‘Logan, and it’s McRae, not McRoy.’

  ‘God, your handwriting’s worse than mine. Lucy Woods, nice to meet you.’ She headed towards the stairs. ‘Might as well get it over with.’

  ‘Trisha? Can you hear me, Trisha? She squatted in front of the stick-thin figure. ‘Trisha? It’s Lucy. I’ve got to take wee Ricky into care while you’re with the police tonight, OK?’

  Trisha swung her head around, like a lump of pasty concrete attached to a chain. Pupils like tiny bugs, heavy lids, mouth open, lips connected by little strings of drool. ‘Whmmm?’

  ‘I said I’ve got to take wee Ricky into care. While you’re in custody?’

  A frown crawled slowly across Trisha’s pale face. ‘Who’re…?’

  ‘Lucy. Lucy Woods? From the social?’

  The frown turned into a glacial smile. ‘But I’m comfy here.’

  The social worker sighed, looked up at Logan. ‘Heroin?’

  ‘Probably. They tried to redecorate the toilet with it when we forced entry.’

  ‘Oh Trisha, you know it’s not good to you. Makes you do bad things.’

  Trisha blinked. It seemed to take a lot of effort. ‘Don’t let them take Ricky! Don’t…’ She pointed a bony finger at the PC standing in the corner. ‘He tried to rape me!’

  Sigh. ‘How much did you take, Trisha?’

  ‘He did! He tried to rape me!’

  ‘That’s a woman, Trisha.’

  Frown. ‘Oh…’ A string of drool spiralled its way to her sunken chest. ‘Someone tried to rape me…’

  Logan folded his arms. ‘She’s been like this for about an hour. Was fine before that.’

  ‘Yes, well, it takes a while for drugs to be absorbed by the system, especially if you practice as much as Trisha.’ Lucy Woods sat back on her heels. ‘Might be an idea to get her up to A&E for the night, just in case.’

  Which was a pain in the arse, but much better than her dying from an overdose in custody. ‘I’ll get someone to run her up.’

  ‘Good.’ The social worker stood. ‘We’re going to take care of wee Ricky for you, OK Trisha?’

  Blink. Blink. She smacked her lips. ‘No…’ Frown. ‘Mum. Mum’ll take him.’ Blink.

  ‘Your mum? Thought she was still in Craiginches?’

  ‘Someone raped me…’ And this time, when her eyes closed they didn’t open again.

  ‘Craiginches?’ Logan watched the social worker shake her head, check Trisha’s pulse, then haul herself to her feet.

  ‘Where’s the wee lad?’

  ‘Other bedroom. She going to be OK?’

  ‘I took over her case when she was thirteen. She’s averaged about two ODs a year since. Better have the hospital pump her stomach too: never know what she’s swallowed.’

  Wee Ricky was huddled in the corner of the room, eyes darting back and forth as Logan followed the social worker inside. Clothes lay strewn across the scabby beige carpet, a line of syringes and flame-blackened spoons on the bedside cabinet.

  One of the Forced Entry team was leaning back against an ancient-looking sideboard, black crash helmet sitting beside her while she flipped through a copy of Hello! She slapped it down on a pile of celebrity gossip mags.

  Even drug dealers and addicts had aspirations. ‘Sarge.’ She nodded at the boy. ‘Watch: he bites.’

  The child bared his teeth, a small growling noise coming from his throat, filthy fingers clutching a plastic Buzz Lightyear like a claw-hammer.

  ‘Ricky?’ Lucy Woods lowered herself down in front of him, waistcoat groaning. ‘You remember me, Ricky?’

  The kid stared at her for a moment, then nodded. ‘Good. We’re going to take you to stay with your granny tonight, OK? While your mum’s not feeling well.’

  Logan hauled the pool car around onto Abbotswell Crescent and into a labyrinth of blank grey granite houses, silent in the dawn’s pale glow.

  Wee Ricky sat in the back with PC Guthrie, the constable looking every bit as wary and worried as the three-year-old.

  Lucy Woods tapped on the passenger-side window. ‘How much do you think that lot’s worth then?’

  Bunches of flowers wrapped in cellophane made a slick that nearly covered the pavement outside a nondescript semi-detached. Teddy bears were tied to the knee-high fence, along with angels, unicorns, and other assorted cuddly toys. Candles in glass jars flickered among the tributes, their light fading before the rising sun. A banner with, ‘JENNY, WE’LL NEVER STOP BELIEVING!’ was tied to stakes in the front garden. A smattering of the posters they’d given away with the Scottish Sun at the weekend: ‘ALISON AND JENNY ∼ NEVER GIVE UP!’ stu
ck to walls, stapled to sticks.

  A handful of people sat at one end of the display, wrapped up in sleeping bags and heavy parka coats, two of them were still awake, smoking cigarettes and sharing a Thermos. They stopped to stare at the pool car as it drifted by.

  One raised a hand, gave a short wave of solidarity, then went back to their vigil.

  The social worker nodded back. ‘Course they never had anything like the X-Factor, or Britain’s Got Talent, or Big Brother, when I was young. Could’ve made it if they had. Been properly famous.’ She turned her head as the public display of grief faded from the rearview mirror. ‘That could be me…’

  Bloody hell.

  Logan glanced at her, then back at the road. Some people should watch what they wish for.

  ‘You sure this is a good idea?’ Logan looked around the living room, trying to find somewhere even vaguely clean to sit.

  The sound of a dog scrabbling at the kitchen door, claws raking the other side of the wood. Deep growls and the occasional outraged bark.

  ‘I’m not supposed to take a kid into care unless there’s no other option.’ Lucy Woods picked a CD from the littered coffee table, the shiny surface glittering in the overhead light. ‘If we can place them with a member of the family we will. Means the kid doesn’t get dragged through the system.’

  ‘Yeah, but…’ Logan lifted his foot, but the carpet didn’t want to let go.

  ‘Trisha’s mum might not be perfect, but at least she’s blood.’ The social worker wrinkled her nose and dropped the CD back into the mess. ‘Fleetwood Mac.’

  A voice at the door behind them: ‘What the fuck’s wrong with Fleetwood Mac?’

  Lucy Woods snapped on a smile. ‘Hi Helen. He go off to sleep OK?’

  ‘What she do this time?’ Helen Brown lurched into the room, swigging from a tin of Tennent’s Super, one leg stiff at the knee. Her face was every bit as thin as her daughter’s, the same dark hollows under her bloodshot eyes, the same yellowy teeth spaced wide in pale gums. Pupils the size of pinpricks.

  She was wearing a pale-grey long-sleeved T-shirt, tugging the cuffs down every time she looked in Logan’s direction. Probably hiding the trackmarks.

  He shifted away from the sticky patch. ‘She’s just helping us with an investigation.’

  Trisha’s mum howched, picked up a scummy mug and spat into it. ‘Hooring, or drugs?’

  ‘I can’t—’

  ‘You fucks is all the same.’ Another swig of extra-strong lager. ‘Hassling folk doing no harm to no one.’ A dribble of liquid ran down her chin, dripped and made a clay-coloured stain on the long-sleeved T-shirt. ‘Fuck is it to you if she’s making a few quid down the docks? Not like she’s robbing auld wifies’ pensions, is it?’

  The social worker cleared her throat. ‘So, Helen, how are you coping? Doing OK?’

  ‘You fuckers should be out there!’ She jabbed a finger at the closed curtains. ‘Looking for that wee girl and her mum. Not arresting my Trisha for giving someone a blowjob!’

  ‘There was a drugs raid and—’

  ‘What, she wouldn’t give you a freebie, so you banged her up? You make me sick! Fucking country’s going to shit and it’s bastards like you dragging it there!’ She tipped the tin of lager to her mouth, glugging it down.

  ‘—in accident and emergency for observation.’

  Helen Brown scrunched the can up and threw it across the room. It bounced off Logan’s chest. ‘What, you going to arrest me too? That’s about your fucking speed, isn’t it? Arrest the victims, when there’s illegal Paki bastards living two doors up, shitting in the street and stealing my fucking washing!’

  Logan brushed the droplets of pale yellow liquid from his jacket. ‘We’ll see ourselves out.’

  Chapter 7

  ‘Mmph…?’ Logan peered out from beneath the duvet. The alarm clock radio stared back at him. He fumbled with the buttons on the top, but it didn’t stop the noise.

  Sat up.

  Phone.

  It was his mobile, in his jacket pocket, hanging on the back of the chair in the corner, warbling the Danse macabre at him.

  God’s sake… He hauled it out and squinted at the glowing screen: ‘DI STEEL’

  Logan stabbed his thumb onto the button. ‘What the hell do you want?’

  There was a pause. ‘You know what costs sod-all in this life, Laz? A smile; a thank you; and my boot up your arse, you rude little—’

  ‘What – do – you – want?’

  ‘Well seeing as the little hand is on the nine, and the big hand is on the twelve, what I want is you at bloody work!’

  He slumped back on the bed, spreadeagled like a pasty star-fish, the scars on his chest and stomach puckered and angry. ‘I only just got home from bloody work.’ A yawn drowned out whatever the inspector said next. Logan shuddered.

  ‘—round like a sodding mentalist. When—’

  ‘Had to pull an all-nighter. Finnie lumbered me with McPherson’s drug busts; was stuck interviewing a smackhead called Shaky Jake till nearly eight this morning. So I’m going back to bed.’

  ‘You’ve no’ seen the papers this morning, have you.’ Not a question.

  ‘I don’t care.’ He dragged the duvet back into place, covering himself. ‘It’s my day off.’

  ‘Your mate Hudson’s a no show.’

  ‘Who the hell is… Oh.’ Dr Hudson – the pathologist. ‘How’s that my fault?’

  ‘Finnie’s going mental – he’s had three PCs in tears already, and it’s no’ even lunchtime.’

  ‘So get a pathologist up from Edinburgh.’ Logan nestled down into his pillow, soft and cool. Yawned again.

  ‘Already tried it – going to be six hours before he gets here. Meanwhile some tosser from SOCA’s turned up to “review the situation,”, and you know what that means…’

  He draped an arm across his eyes. ‘It’s my day off!’

  ‘Now’s no’ the time to be missing in action, Laz. No’ if you don’t fancy working fraud cases for the rest of your natural. I’m serious: spreadsheets and accountants from here till retirement.’

  ‘But I’ve got a thing on this—’

  ‘Pick up something tasty on the way in, eh? And some decent coffee for a change.’

  The line went dead.

  The sun glared down from a pale blue sky, a few thin wisps of white making sod all difference to the harsh light. Logan trudged up Marischal Street, hands in his pockets.

  Bunch of bastards. An hour: was that too much to ask for? An hour in his own bloody bed. Never mind actually getting to take some bloody time off.

  High above, fat seagulls screamed and swore, spattering a rusty hatchback with stinking polka dots.

  Logan came to a halt at the top of the hill, where the road joined onto the tail end of Union Street, and stared across the road. Lodge Walk – the little alley that ran between the Town House and the Sheriff Court – was choked with journalists, photographers, and TV crews. DI Bell was caught in the middle of them, a little hairy island in a sea of bastards, all shouting questions and waving cameras. Poor sod had probably been caught trying to sneak out of Force Headquarters’ secret side door.

  Well, he was on his own, because there was no way Logan was wading in to help.

  A newsagents lurked on one side of the Mercat Cross, the windows dulled by a thin film of dust. One of those redand-white sandwich boards was parked out on the cobbled pedestrian area in front of the shop: ‘TORTURED JENNY LOSES TOE – POLICE POWERLESS’ printed in thick black lettering above the Aberdeen Examiner logo.

  Logan hesitated for a moment, then went in. Every tabloid newspaper in the place had something similar screaming from the front page. The Sport had gone for ‘TOE HORRIBLE FOR WORDS’, the Press and Journal – ‘KIDNAP HORROR FIND’, Evening Express – ‘“I CAN FIND JENNY” SAYS NE PSYCHIC’… He bought an

  Examiner and a P&J, then nipped next door to the bakers for a couple of bacon butties and something for himself.

  Stee
l could get the damn coffees for once.

  He dragged his phone out as he trudged along the pavement and made a quick call.

  ‘What the bloody hell are you eating?’ DI Steel had her feet up on the desk, one hand wrapped around a white floury roll with slivers of deep-fried pig sticking out the edges.

  ‘Fish finger buttie. And I’m only here till twelve, understand?’

  ‘You’re no’ right in the head, Laz: butties are all about the bacon.’ She took a huge bite, getting a smear of tomato sauce on her cheek. ‘So, come on then – what did you get out of Shaky Jake? He still on the crutches?’

  ‘I mean it: twelve o’clock on the dot. I’ve got a thing on and I can’t be late, or—’

  ‘Focus for five minutes, will you? Shaky Jake.’

  Logan frowned at her. ‘It’s McPherson’s case.’

  ‘Humour me.’

  ‘Yeah, he’s still on the crutches. They had to fuse his ankle-bones into one big lump after Wee Hamish’s lads took a pickaxe to them. Walks like a penguin now. Lucky the hospital didn’t just amputate his feet.’

  ‘Silly sod shouldn’t have helped himself to the merchandise then, should he? How much gear did you get?’

  ‘Three bricks of heroin, two of cannabis resin, some E, a big suitcase full of mephedrone, two replica handguns, and some dodgy porno DVDs.’

  ‘Oh aye?’ Steel sat upright. ‘Anything I should be reviewing?’

  ‘Already sent them over to Trading Standards.’

  She slumped back again. ‘Sod.’ Another bite of buttie. ‘And which one of your daft buggers let Shuggie Webster escape?’

  Logan squirted another sachet of tartar sauce onto his fish fingers, not looking the inspector in the eye. ‘It’s all in the report.’

  ‘“Operational difficulties” my sharny arse – it was that useless bum-crack Ferguson, wasn’t it?’

  ‘We had to get the social out to—’

  ‘Aye, Trisha Brown’s wee lad. I do read these things, you know. How was her mum?’

  ‘How do you think?

  ‘Pished, rancid, and racist?’ Steel nodded. ‘Her granny was the same. Trisha’s your genuine third-generation drug user. Really makes you hold out hope for her wee boy, doesn’t it? Other kids’ll be showing each other their knickers behind the bike sheds: he’ll be doing crack.’ She sooked a greasy fingertip clean. ‘What else you got on for McPherson?’