She curled her hands around the polystyrene cup, peering at him over the edge. Her accent was pure New York, a lot stronger than the one she’d used on the TV and completely unlike the voice she’d used on film, necklacing the man whose face wasn’t composited properly. ‘Well, well, well. . .’ A slow, naughty smile. ‘Nichole, you said he was cute, but you didn’t tell me he was a hunk too.’
It got very hot between Logan’s neck and his collar. ‘Well, it. . . I. . .’
‘That’s some pair of black eyes you got there. Makes me think of Fight Club, God I loved that film. Very sexy.’ She stuck out her hand for shaking. ‘McRae. . . You’re the guy who used to be David’s protégé, right? ’
‘Well, I don’t know if I’d—’
Insch thumped Logan on the back. ‘Of course you were.’ The grin changed into a frown as he hunched forward in front of his stars. ‘Now, are you both OK? Need anything? ’
Nichole smiled at him. ‘We’re fine, honestly.’ Then she slipped her arm through Logan’s. Looking up at him with those pale-blue eyes, the pupils large, dark, and shiny as buttons. ‘So, DI McRae, have you come here to sample Rudy and Lola’s chicken casserole, or. . .? ’
It was definitely getting warmer out here. ‘We need to find anyone who’s seen Agnes Garfield, or knows where she is.’
‘God, Agnes. . .’ Morgan made choking noises. ‘Don’t get me wrong, lovely girl, but jeesh, she could be intense.’
Nichole gave his arm a squeeze. ‘It was such a shame, she was so desperate to get into film. It was her life’s ambition.’
Insch cleared his throat. ‘Yes, well. . .’
‘Zander was going to give her a trial as my body double. She was so excited. And then she just. . .’ Nichole shrugged. The movement rubbed Logan’s arm up, then down the side of her breast.
‘She flipped. Wigged out.’ Morgan bugged her eyes. ‘Went totally pill-popping crazy. I came back from makeup one time, and she was in my trailer trying on my underwear. True story. Then she has a complete fit because she says I’m not doing Mrs Shepherd’s lines right and the character has to be more creepy, and I’m like, you’re the creepy one: get out of my bra!’
Nichole took a sip of coffee. ‘Well, to be fair, she did a lot of good too. We wouldn’t be doing this right now if it wasn’t for her. Giving something back to the community’s really important and she set it all up.’
Morgan rolled her eyes. ‘Ack, you’re so nice I could stab you.’
Logan pulled out his poster again. ‘Have you seen her recently? She might have changed her appearance, dyed her hair? ’
Morgan squinted at it. ‘Wow. Is it just me, or does she look like she’s trying to turn herself into Rowan? All she needs is the scar. . .’
Nichole looked away, back down the tunnel towards the soup kitchen. ‘She was here last Friday night. Morgan and I like to help out down here when we can – the usual food’s nowhere near as good as tonight’s, but the people making it really care about the homeless. I was on bread-and-butter duty and I. . .’ A frown painted little creases between her eyebrows. ‘I thought I saw someone watching from the shadows. As if they were afraid to come out into the light.’ She shrugged. ‘So I went over to say hello, see if they needed help. It was Agnes, she. . . She said some pretty hurtful things, then she ran away. I went after her, tried to make her see it was OK, but she lost me in the St Nicholas Kirk graveyard.’
Wonderful. ‘Why didn’t you come forward? ’
‘What good would it have done? I didn’t know where she was, I didn’t know where she was going, how could that help? ’
Morgan took a step closer, gazing up into his eyes. Boxing him in. Her pupils were massive too. . . That familiar sweet, slightly sweaty, smell of smoke coming off her. ‘I know this is kinda out of left field, but if I asked very nicely, would you arrest me? I could smash something, or, you know, hit someone, but I just want to spend a night in the cells. See what it’s like? ’
‘Agnes isn’t well, Inspector McRae, she needs someone to stand up for her, not betray her.’
‘See, I gotta film after this one, where I’m this lap-dancer who gets kidnapped by a serial killer, and I figure she must’ve done time, right? She’s hard-as-nails on the outside, but there’s this core of vulnerability to her, and I think the experience of getting arrested would really help me connect with her? ’ Morgan placed a hand on Logan’s chest. ‘On an emotional level? ’
He closed his eyes, massaged his throbbing temples. ‘I’m not arresting you.’
‘I played a veterinarian once, and spent a month working in an animal pound. Informed my whole interpretation of the character. It was a very powerful performance, I—’
‘If you see Agnes, if she tries to get in touch, I want you to call me: day or night, don’t care.’ He pulled out a couple of Grampian Police business cards and printed his mobile number on the back of each. Then handed them out. ‘We can’t help Agnes if we can’t find her.’
He’d taken half a dozen steps away towards where he’d left Henry Scott, when Morgan’s voice echoed out behind him. ‘OK, so if getting arrested’s out, how about a good spanking instead? I’ll let you tie me up and everything.’ Followed by raucous, filthy laughter.
For God’s sake. . . Logan kept going.
Insch huffed up beside him, the grin replaced by a loose-jowled scowl. ‘What did I tell you about chatting up my actresses? ’
‘In what way was that my fault? ’ Logan stopped opposite the barrelled archway where Henry Scott had been cowering. It was empty now, just a lingering sour odour of unwashed clothes and BO to show that he’d been there at all. The little sod could’ve waited – Logan had fetched his bloody dinner for him. ‘Thanks, Henry.’
‘I’m serious.’ Insch glanced back over his shoulder. Nichole and Morgan waved at him. He waved back, then lowered his voice. ‘Do you have any idea how difficult it is to keep everyone happy and motivated? ’
‘That why they’re stoned all the time? ’
Insch stared at him. ‘I have no idea what you’re—’
‘Oh come off it, the pair of them have pupils the size of doorknobs. I’m not an idiot.’
Silence. ‘You know as well as I do: criminalizing cannabis usage is a waste of police time and doesn’t—’
‘Trust me, I’ve got bigger things to worry about than what your stars are smoking.’
Insch closed his eyes and massaged his temples, breath hissing in and out through his nose. ‘Look, I know you’re busy, I know you’ve got other things on, but I really need you to stop this counterfeiting ring. It’s important.’
Logan pulled the spork out of the mound of chicken and chorizo casserole and helped himself to a bite. Well, Henry Scott wasn’t going to miss it, was he? It tasted as good as it smelled, even if it was getting cold.
‘Logan—’
‘I’ll see what I can do.’
Voices echoed through Grampian Police Force Headquarters as nightshift clocked on and shuffled out onto the rain-misted streets, fluorescent yellow waistcoats on over their black uniforms. Moaning.
Logan ran a hand through his hair and flicked the water off against the painted breezeblock wall of the cell block.
One of the nightshift PCSOs scowled at him from the other end of the corridor, carrying a tray with half a dozen steaming mugs on it. His pornstar moustache bristled. ‘You’re dripping on my floor!’
‘I’m not stopping, Andy. Just checking up on a couple of prisoners.’
‘Bad enough I’ve got drunks puking and peeing on it, without you CID scumbags dripping all over the place.’
Logan helped himself to one of the mugs. ‘Thanks.’
‘Hey!’ He snatched it back. ‘Those are for the guests. You want a cuppa? Get it yourself.’
‘Who stuck an angry badger up your bum? ’ Logan slid back the hatch on the nearest cell, the one with ‘STACEY GOURDON ~ BOTP’ written on the board by the door, and peer
ed inside. ‘She give you any trouble? ’
Stacey sat on the blue plastic mattress with her back against the wall, blood-flecked knees drawn up against her chest. No scabs left, she must’ve eaten them all. She looked up, smiled, then made the universal gesture for ‘wanker’.
Lovely girl.
Stacey stood and padded across the cell floor on bare feet. ‘You here to interrogate me too? Think you can beat a confession out of me? Well, I’ll tell you exactly the same thing I told your hairy little friend: I don’t have to tell you where I was when Anthony went missing, or where I was when he died. And there’s nothing you can do about it.’
Why did it sound as if she was auditioning for the part of ‘Suspect number one’? Making herself look more dodgy than she needed to. Playing him. . .
Logan paused, then sighed. Of course she was. ‘Yes, well done. Very melodramatic.’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘Don’t you patronize me.’
‘You really think this is the best way to get your daddy’s attention? Get tied up in a murder enquiry? Maybe sell your sordid little story to the papers? Scandalize the neighbourhood? ’
Stacey stuck out her chest, her smile wide, voice silky. ‘I had a threesome with the victim and the girl who killed him. I think I’m entitled to some compensation for my grief and distress, don’t you? It’s not my problem if you—’
Logan slammed the hatch shut on her. ‘Andy, feel free to spit in her tea, OK? ’
Downstairs, in the lower set of cell blocks, the sound of a pissed-up rendition of ‘American Pie’ warbled and roared out from the cell next door to Dr Marks’s. Whoever was on the other side screamed a non-stop barrage of abuse and threats at someone called Baz for sleeping with his girlfriend.
It wasn’t quite Tourette’s, but it was the next best thing. Which meant Logan probably owed Kathy a couple of pints at least.
Dr Marks sat on the floor, backed into a corner, rocking gently away, chewing on the side of his thumb. ‘I know what you’re doing and it’s not going to work. Doctor-patient confidentiality is imperative in my line of work.’
Logan settled down on the end of the mattress. ‘It doesn’t have to be like this.’
‘You can’t. . . I won’t betray my principles.’ Blood dripped from the end of his chewed thumb. He stuck it in his mouth and sucked. ‘I won’t.’
‘If you think a couple of hours in the cells is bad, just wait till the Sheriff gives you a week in Craiginches for contempt.’
‘I can’t. . .’
‘She’s out there killing people, and you can help us stop her. Think about it.’
He sniffed, blinked. Chewed on his bleeding thumb. ‘I can’t. . .’
In the cell next door, ‘American Pie’ was replaced by Billy Joel’s ‘Piano Man’, roared out like a football chant.
Logan stood and smiled down at Dr Marks. ‘I’ll pop past in the morning: say goodbye before they drag you off.’ A wink. ‘Have a nice night.’
Police. They spill out of the ugly striped building like woodlice from beneath a rotting log. Marching about, dragging coils of fizzing blue and red behind them like angry tentacles. Reaching along the granite streets, searching, probing.
They should be on the same side, but they’re not. They don’t see. Don’t see the Beasts and the Angels, the Witches and the Kelpie, the Wraith and the Ogres and the Ghosts. Don’t see the Hand of Death as they prowl the street.
They think everyone is Sheep.
They think she is Sheep.
But she’s so much more than that.
Rowan takes a deep breath and crosses the road – walks out into the middle of them.
The Kirk is my sword and my shield.
A pair of them laugh at a shared joke, shoulders hunched against the rain. They don’t even see her.
Then there he is.
In the tunnels beneath the earth he looked so normal, but here. . . His aura is different from the others. It’s blue and red, but ribbons of gold and black undulate around his head. A halo of light and darkness. Is he an Angel, or a Hand of Death? Does he even know himself?
And if she told him, would it make any difference?
He turns up his collar and runs across the road to his weary battered Fiat, fumbles with his keys, swearing in the rain, then gets in behind the wheel. Reverses out of the parking space in a cloud of greasy exhaust, his aura lighting up the inside of the car like an angry disco.
Rowan steps out onto the road, watching him disappear into the rain. Then reaches into her pocket and feels the knot of bones, safe in its nest of tissue paper.
Soon. . .
She turns her face to the heavy orange clouds and closes her eyes. The rain is cool and soothing on her skin, tiny cold kisses from the heavens. Making everything—
The hard blare of a car horn makes her flinch. She spins around and there’s a patrol car less than three feet away. Its headlights flash at her, and she holds up a hand, then steps back onto the pavement.
The patrol car drives by. Its occupants don’t even look in her direction. They think she’s just another Sheep.
Rowan steps back out into the road. His Fiat is nothing but a memory written on tarmac with raindrops. But that’s all right. She has plenty of time to wander back to where her own car’s parked.
After all, there’s no need to rush: she knows where he’s going.
Wednesday
36
The kettle’s grumbling rattle came through from the kitchen, fighting against the sound of Breakfast News in the living room where, apparently, everyone was getting great weather except for the north-east of Scotland. As bloody usual.
Logan lay back on the bed, arms folded behind his head. Have to get up in a minute. Any minute now. . .
A clunk and the kettle lost its battle with the weatherman.
Jackie padded through wearing nothing but a Strathclyde Police Judo Team T-shirt, with a mug of tea in each hand and a slice of toast sticking out of her mouth. ‘Mnnnphnnn gnnph? ’
He sat up and accepted the proffered mug. ‘Still raining? ’
She pulled the toast out and chewed. ‘Give me two reasons why I should stay with Bill.’
Oh great: this again. ‘He’s Rory’s father? ’
‘That’s one. And it’s not even that good a reason. He’s still a selfish prick.’ She tore a bite out of the toast. ‘I am not moving to London, I don’t care if this is the job opportunity of a lifetime.’
The sigh escaped before he could stop it. Logan swung his legs out of the bed. ‘If you don’t like him, why do you stay with him? ’
‘That’s what I just asked you.’
Logan picked yesterday’s socks and pants off the floor and dumped them in the laundry basket, before shuffling and yawning through to the bathroom for a pee and a shower.
By the time he got back, Jackie was levering herself into the feat of mechanical engineering that was a concrete-coloured Doreen Triumph bra. Making it look as if she was wearing two halved zeppelins from the 1930s. The shiny crescent-shaped scar above her industrial grey pants disappeared as she hauled on her suit trousers.
At least she only had the one scar.
A linen shirt went over the bra that time forgot. ‘What are we doing? ’
Good question. Logan sat on the bed and pulled on a fresh pair of socks. ‘Same as usual, I suppose.’ Next: a pair of lucky bright-red pants, then suit trousers. ‘Reaching out because we’re lonely. Looking for a little comfort. A little human warmth. . . What? ’
She was staring at him with her mouth hanging open. ‘I meant what are we doing tonight? Not what,’ she pointed at them both, ‘whatever this is.’
‘Oh. Right.’ Heat raced up his neck into his cheeks and ears. ‘OK. Well, if you’re not going back to Glasgow, we could—’
‘Are you feeling guilty? Is that it? Guilty because she’s in the hospital? ’
Logan picked the nearest shirt in the wardrobe. ‘Yes
.’
‘In the name of the wee man. . .’ She grabbed her jacket. ‘Where did I leave my shoes? ’ Then stomped out of the bedroom, making the caravan floor shake.
Yes, because it was all his fault. He followed her into the living room, hauling the shirt on. ‘So you don’t feel guilty for cheating on Bill? ’
‘She’s been up there for two years, Logan, you really think that’s what she wants? You feeling guilty for having sex three or four times a year? ’
A wrinkled satchel of a face frowned out at them from the TV. ‘. . .important to remember that these are the people who support police investigations. They help catch killers. How can they do their job if the SPSA keeps changing everything? ’
‘You didn’t answer the question.’
‘I. . .’ Her face pinched, eyes narrowed, then she turned and grabbed a pair of low-heeled boots from under the coffee table. ‘Going to be late.’
Mr Satchelface was replaced by a woman in an ugly blouse. ‘Aberdeen now, and Grampian Police have issued a fresh appeal for information regarding the whereabouts of Agnes Garfield. . .’
‘Jackie, it’s—’
‘Of course I feel bloody guilty! OK? And I shouldn’t, he doesn’t deserve my guilt – he’s a selfish, thoughtless bastard who never even sees me any more. Even when he does come home, it’s like I’m not there.’
‘. . .any information to call the hotline number, or contact your local police station. . .’
Jackie thumped down on the couch and hauled on her boots. ‘But would I leave him? Nooooo, I had to make it work for Rory’s sake, didn’t I? Why be happy in life when you can be bloody miserable? ’
‘So leave him.’
‘What about Rory? ’
‘In other news, police checkpoints are in place on the A96 between Kintore and Blackburn. . .’
Logan sat down on the couch beside her. ‘What’s going to be better for him growing up: you happy, or you miserable? ’
Close to the Bone (Special Edition) (Logan McRae, Book 8) Page 33
