In the Cold Dark Ground (7 page)

‘Yes, but you didn’t
know
you were selling to someone dodgy.’

‘Think that’ll matter to Napier?’ A grimace. ‘I could fit Reuben up? Get him sent down for something. Keep him out of the way for eight to twelve years.’

‘And all he has to do is make one phone call to the outside world and have some of his minions pop up to Banff and do the job for him.’ A sigh. ‘Oh, Logan…’ She stepped in, her body warm against his chest. Reached up and kissed him. ‘I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to kill Reuben.’

‘Of course they’re no’ connected, you idiot.’ Steel had a pull on her e-cigarette, then let the steam trickle out of her nose. It found its way down the wrinkles either side of her mouth. Then the ones around her eyes deepened. ‘Now, does anyone
else
have a stupid question?’ Her grey suit looked as if someone much larger than her had slept in it. Whoever it was had done something unmentionable to her hair as well. Possibly involving an electric whisk, a Van de Graaff generator, and a bucket of wallpaper paste.

The DC lowered his hand and mumbled something. Pink flushed the back of his neck, darkening the skin above his suit jacket.

Steel had a dig at her underwire and settled on the edge of a table parked beneath the whiteboard. The board took up nearly the whole wall of the station’s Major Incident Room.

The conference table in the middle of the room was packed with uniformed and plain-clothed officers. They’d commandeered every chair in the place, set up in a long line facing the board. More Uniform stood around the walls, arms folded across their black police-issue T-shirts.

‘Moving on.’ Steel stopped fiddling with her upholstery for long enough to point her fake cigarette at the whiteboard. An array of photographs – much like the ones Logan had on his phone – were Blu-Tacked across the shiny white surface, along with an OS map of the woods. ‘Post mortem is at ten. Till then, the powers that be are no’ letting us unwrap our present.’

The e-cigarette clicked against a close-up of the bin-bag taped over the body’s head.

Another hand went up. ‘Guv: how come?’

She didn’t look at the questioner. ‘What did I say about stupid questions?’

The hand went down again. ‘Sorry, Guv.’

‘Soon as they break the seal and invalidate the warranty, DS Dawson will be taking an ID photo and emailing it straight up. If we’re lucky, one of the local bunnets will recognize our victim. But just in case: I want posters. Becky? You’re on that. Blanket coverage.’

A large woman in a black suit nodded, sending her frizzy brown hair wobbling. ‘Guv.’

‘Next.’ She tossed a pile of printouts to the person sitting nearest – a thin bloke in a cheap fighting suit and seven-quid haircut.

He took one, then passed the rest on.

She waited for the printouts to get halfway around the room. ‘We got an MO hit on the database. Naked body, battered, bag over the head, dumped in woods. Last one belonged to a Lithuanian pimp operating on Leith Walk, Edinburgh, six months ago.’

The stack had made its way as far as Logan. Steel’s handout had half a dozen photos on it: different views of a body like the one from yesterday, only this victim was lying on a mortuary slab instead of the forest floor and the bag over his head had been slit open, revealing a gaunt face with a hooked nose and crooked teeth. More bruising. Both eyes swollen shut.

‘Allegedly, Artu¯ras Kazlauskas didn’t bother asking Malk the Knife’s permission before hooring women out in his city, so Malky sent someone round to teach him some manners. Details are the same, right down to the body getting a dose of bleach after death to mask DNA and trace evidence.’ She took a sheet of paper from a folder and stuck it to the whiteboard with some fridge magnets. It was blown-up from a magazine, part of the text running down one side of the image. A man with a short haircut, baggy eyes, cheery cheeks, and a tuxedo. It was the kind of face that belonged on a Rotary Club steering committee, that always bought the first round, that invited friends from work over for a barbecue, and never forgot the receptionist’s birthday.

Steel poked it in the forehead with her fake fag. ‘Malcolm McLennan, AKA: Malk the Knife. Edinburgh’s Mr Huge. You run drugs, guns, illegal immigrants, or prostitutes in the city, he gets a cut or you wind up missing important bits.
If
you’re lucky.’

Logan turned his sheet over. There were another three bodies pictured on the back. All naked, all male, all battered, all with bin-bags duct-taped over their heads.

Steel sniffed. ‘And before some smart aleck asks the obvious question: no, we don’t know who killed this lot. Don’t even know if it’s the same person each time. And the Organised Crime and Counter Terrorism Unit can’t prove Malky ordered the killings either. So they’re about as much use as Rennie in a knocking shop.’

‘Hey!’

‘Shut up.’

Logan turned the paper back over again. Jessica Campbell was bringing drugs into Aberdeenshire from Glasgow. And now Malcolm McLennan was killing people in Banff. John Urquhart was right: Wee Hamish Mowat might not be dead yet, but the big boys were already muscling in.

Which meant that sooner or later, Reuben was going to kick back. Hard.

The post-briefing rush for the canteen and the toilets thundered through the station as Steel lounged by the Major Incident Room window, smoking her fake cigarette and exploring her armpit with one hand while the other pinned a mobile phone to her ear. ‘Yeah… Nah… Did he?… Yeah…’

Logan folded the printout with its dead bodies into four and stuck it on the table.

Rennie slouched over. ‘You run B Division, right?’

‘Why?’

‘The guvnor wants a couple of bunnets to go door-to-door when pics of the victim’s face come in. You can spare me two or three, can’t you?’

Logan stared at him. ‘First: you don’t get to call my divisional officers, “Bunnets”.’

Rennie pursed his lips. ‘Someone’s touchy the day.’

‘Second: my
divisional officers
will be busy policing B Division. They will
not
have time to go running about doing your legwork for you.’ Logan took a couple of steps, then poked Rennie in the chest. ‘Third: most of them have been in the job a lot longer than you, and they deserve a bit of respect. Are we clear?’

Rennie’s bottom lip popped out. ‘Only asking.’

He stepped closer, till they were nearly nose-to-nose. ‘Well don’t.’

There was a snort from the corner, then Steel’s gravelly tones burst across the room. ‘For God’s sake, will you two just kiss and get it over with? Could cut the sexual tension in here with a spoon.’

Logan stayed where he was. ‘Detective Sergeant Rennie and I were discussing resource allocation.’

‘Nah, you pair were about to whip out your truncheons and give each other a good seeing to. But far be it from me to stand in the way of young love: if you promise no’ to give Rennie back with his arse all covered in lovebites, you can “discuss resource allocations” to your heart’s content.’

‘What?’ There was a shudder, then Rennie backed away wearing his spanked child expression. ‘I only wanted a couple of bodies to help with the ID. You didn’t have to get all threatening about it. Was only—’

Steel rapped her knuckles on the tabletop. ‘Rennie: coffee. Two and a coo.’

‘But, Guv, I wasn’t doing any—’

‘You heard: milk and two sugars. And I hear rumours someone’s got a malt loaf planked somewhere. I’ll have a slice of that too.’

‘But,
Gu-uv
…’

‘
Now
, Detective Sergeant.’

His bottom lip got poutier. Then he turned and shuffled out of the room. Closed the door behind him.

Steel crossed her arms and frowned at Logan. ‘Who crapped in your porridge then?’

‘I don’t have to—’

‘Having a go at poor wee Rennie. Police Scotland doesn’t approve of workplace bullying, you grumpy old sack of—’

‘Oh come off it, you say worse to him all the time! And—’

‘You were being a dick, Laz. Spoiling for a fight.’ Steel shook her head. ‘With
Rennie
. Be like kicking a puppy, then sticking it in a tumble dryer with a bucket of broken glass. Then setting fire to the tumble dryer.’

Yeah.

Logan sighed. Screwed his face up into a knot.

She was right: picking on Rennie wasn’t fair. Steel’s DS might be an idiot, but it wasn’t
his
fault Logan had barely slept. Wasn’t his fault Reuben loomed over everything like a massive rabid dog.

‘Sorry.’ Logan ran a hand across the stubble on top of his head. ‘Been a tough week. I’ll apologize.’

‘Don’t care how rough it is, you don’t ruin a perfectly good tumble dryer.’ She took a puff on her e-cigarette. ‘Going to be a total nightmare to live with now. He’ll be slumping about with a face like a cat’s bum, all martyred and woe-is-me.’

‘I’ll talk to him.’ Logan looked away. Outside, the violet sky was fringed with pre-dawn blue and pink. The lights of Macduff twinkled on the other side of the bay. ‘We’re switching Samantha off tomorrow. Life support.’

A sigh. Then Steel took hold of his arm and squeezed. ‘You going to be OK?’

‘Yeah. Course.’ He frowned. ‘Don’t know.’ Then let out a long, slow breath. ‘Anyway, suppose I’d better…’ He nodded at the door. ‘Got to go brief the team.’

‘…so make sure you keep your eyes open, OK?’ Logan settled back against the windowsill and rested his mug of tea on a stack of case files.

The Constables’ Office wasn’t a large room. Old-fashioned with worktop desks on two walls, covered in paperwork and four ancient grey computers. Four office chairs, most of which looked on the verge of collapse – the foam rubber stuck out of one as if it had prolapsed. Three uniformed officers in Police Scotland ninja black stared at him.

Calamity clicked the point of her pen in and out and in and out.
Click
,
click
,
click
. ‘What about a national appeal? Maybe we’re not getting any sightings because Tracy’s left the area?’

A wee soft voice piped up. ‘Can’t really blame her, can you?’ Isla pulled her auburn hair back into a thick ponytail and tied it off. Didn’t matter if she was in her thirties or not, she still looked like a teenager – heart-shaped face, red lipstick, with more eyeshadow and mascara than was strictly necessary for arresting people. Her little legs barely reached the ground as she swivelled back and forth in her chair, the toe of her boots barely scraping the carpet. ‘If I had Big Donald Brown for a dad? I’d do a runner too.’ Hair done, she took a sip of coffee. ‘Good luck to her.’

Logan frowned up at the rogues’ gallery above the radiator – a double row of local drug dealers and thieves scowled back at him from their photocopied pictures. Big Donald Brown was second row, three in from the right. A slab of flesh with a broad forehead, prominent ears, and the kind of eyebrows that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a Border terrier. ‘Anyone know if she’s run away from home before?’

Tufty checked his notes, the pink tip of his tongue poking out between his lips as he skimmed them. The strip light glowed in his ginger crewcut, giving him a fiery halo. Which was probably as close as he was ever going to get. ‘She’s nineteen, Sarge. It’s not really running away from home, is it?’

‘Still…’ Logan chewed on his bottom lip for a moment. ‘Doesn’t matter how much of a scumbag her dad is, he’s worried about her.’ He pointed. ‘Isla, get onto the media office and tell them we’re after a spot on the news and all the social media they can throw at it. If they give you any grief you have my permission to do the little-girl-lost routine you think none of us know about.’

A nod. ‘Sarge.’

‘Next: Constable Quirrel, I believe you have an announcement for us.’

A grin ripped across Tufty’s thin face, He swept his arms out, as if introducing a magic trick. ‘And on the second-last shift of his indented servitude, verily didst the Probationer say, “Let there be Jaffa Cakes!”’

Calamity and Isla gave him a round of applause.

Logan couldn’t help smiling. ‘Well done, young Tufty. You shall go to the top of the class.’

The grin got bigger. ‘Thanks, Sarge.’ He dipped into his desk and came out with the promised packet of cakey biscuits.

Logan helped himself. ‘And as a reward, you can lead the rest of the briefing.’

Tufty swivelled his chair around and wiggled his mouse, bringing up the next slide on the daily PowerPoint presentation. Martin Milne stared out at them. A strong face with high cheekbones and a dimple right in the middle of his chin. Straight brown hair with a Hugh Grant fringe. ‘I checked distinguishing features on the misper form, and there’s no mention of Milne having a tattoo. So that means whoever we found yesterday, it’s not him. Might be worth checking signs of activity on his bank or credit cards?’

Isla rolled her eyes. ‘You got any idea how long it’ll take his bank to authorize that?’

‘Ah, but no, my dearest Constable Anderson, because I has a
clever
.’ Tufty leaned forward. ‘We don’t need to hang about and wait for his bank to approve access if he’s on internet banking: we can ask his wife to log on and check. Could ask her about the tattoo while we’re there – make sure that whatever muppet filled in the misper form got it right.’

‘Is that
cynicism
I hear?’ A smile pulled Isla’s cheeks into shiny pink apples. ‘Ah, Tufty, we’ll make a police officer of you yet.’

‘Next.’ A click of the mouse and a man’s face filled the screen: jowls, one solid eyebrow, hair shaved at the sides to match the bald spot at the top. ‘Mark Connolly violated his parole, Friday…’

Sitting in the driver’s seat, Tufty doo-de-doo-de-dooed along with the old Oasis track jangling out of the speakers. He slowed down as the beige outskirts of Whitehills appeared, then took a left, heading towards the slate-grey sea.

Wind buffeted the Big Car, rocking it on its springs. Rain crackled against the windscreen, blurring the world for a moment, before the wipers squeaked it away. Only for more rain to replace it moments later.

Logan shifted in his seat. The limb restraints made a hard lump in the small of his back, right where the stabproof vest ended. And would they shift? Of course they wouldn’t.

The road narrowed – lined on both sides by billowing green clouds of jagged gorse. Writhing beneath a raven sky.

Why did Samantha think he could just kill Reuben? That he was even capable of killing another human being. OK, maybe ‘human being’ was stretching things a bit where Reuben was concerned, but still. To actually
murder
someone. Cold. Premeditated.

Logan’s stomach lurched, sour and gurgling.

Oasis faded a bit and the DJ teuchtered all over them. ‘
Wisn’t that a flash fae the past? You’re listening till “Gid Mornin’ Doogie!” and it’s bang on eight, so here’s oor Ashley with a’ the news and weather.
’