Snapshot (22 page)

Winter covered his head and pushed himself back up onto his feet, taking a boot to his right knee for his efforts. Pain shot through it, causing it to buckle and he sank down, half kneeling. He fired out a punch at the nearest person and caught him solid, hearing a groan and footsteps staggering back. He threw back an elbow and caught someone else somewhere solid. It gave him enough breathing space to get to his feet and see three guys in hoodies, two with scarves over their faces and the third, much taller and broader than the other two, was wearing a balaclava that showed only his eyes. Winter lashed out at the nearest one with a boot and caught him in the balls.

His success didn’t last long though and he felt a fist crash into the side of his head, nearly putting his lights out. Bodies were on him like pack rats and he went down under the weight as boots and punches rained in on him. He could taste blood in his mouth. Pain chased pain over his body like an electric circuit. He heard Rory’s name again but couldn’t take much in. Fuck. A kick to the side of his head delivered a dull sting and he knew he was close to blacking out.

Maybe he had because he was suddenly aware of them having stopped and could only feel the aches that were in every bone. He still had his hands wrapped round his head but no more blows came.

‘Sorry.’

Had the cunts in the hoods suddenly developed a conscience? He seriously doubted it. He lifted his head gingerly and peeled his arms away, seeing two wooden pegs with rubber soles just a few inches from his eyes. Crutches.

Rory McCabe looked terrified, probably as much for himself as for Winter. He tottered nervously above him, his damaged knee bent and his leg raised from the ground.

‘Shite, I’m really sorry. I didn’t ask them to do this. I really didn’t know they were going to do anything.’

Winter looked up at him, wiping blood from his mouth and massaging his ribs.

‘One of those guys was waiting at the hospital when I came to photograph you, wasn’t he? The big guy with the balaclava?’

Rory blanched.

‘He fits the description of the guy you said beat you up,’ Winters persisted.

‘No, no way.’ McCabe hissed at him. ‘Lee is just trying to protect me.’

He stopped, realizing he’d said too much. ‘Look you won’t tell the cops, will you?’

Winter knew he probably couldn’t have told them even if he wanted to but Rory didn’t know that. He looked the kid in the eye.

‘I’m not sure. I might have to.’

‘Fucksake,’ the boy whispered, leaning back against the wall so that it held him up. ‘He’s just looking out for me. He’s in the army and will be in big trouble if this goes to the cops.’

‘I’m not sure I have any choice.’

‘Right, I’ll tell you who Kieran’s dealer was, okay? Then you don’t come back here again and you don’t mention Lee to the polis. Right?’

That sounded like a great deal to Winter.

‘Fair enough.’

‘Okay. It was a guy named Sammy Ross. He’s from Royston and . . .’

A couple of phone calls was all it took for Narey to learn that Melanie’s boyfriend Tommy Breslin was, as they say, known to the police. He had previous for theft, aggravated assault and possession with intent to supply but he also had a reputation for a violent temper. Colin Daly, a mate of Narey’s at Maryhill cop shop said that basically T-Bone Breslin was a bad bastard who was quick to use his fists, his boots or whatever he had to hand. He was a dealer with a sideline in pimping and if he could combine the two then all the better. Daly reckoned chances were that all the money that Melanie earned on the streets went straight to Breslin for drugs, leaving her broke and dependent on him as well as crack cocaine.

Daly’s suggestion that Narey would be better taking a couple of burly cops with her instead of Julia Corrieri was, inevitably, met with an indignant retort. In the end, though, Narey saw the benefit of having the added manpower at least to get the door open and that was why there were four officers standing on the doorstep of Breslin’s flat in Summerston at seven that morning.

Corrieri stood at the back with the two uniforms in between her and Narey who was about to knock on the heavy door. It wasn’t exactly the loudest of knocks but after a few seconds, the DS stood back and nodded at the constables to do their business. They advanced holding the enforcer ram and slammed sixteen kilos of hardened steel into Breslin’s door. With a bang, the door flew open, leaving the remnants of hinges, bolts and chains scattered on the floor. The uniforms stepped aside and Narey strode into the flat, just in time to see Breslin burst naked, shaken and bleary-eyed from a bedroom clutching a baseball bat.

The DS stood her ground and just looked at him, flipping open her warrant card holder and holding it up in front.

‘Police, Mr Breslin. I suggest you put that weapon down.’

He glared at her, still trying to take in what was happening. He held the bat in both hands, legs wide, swishing it through the air as he weighed up his options. None of the cops moved, letting him come to his own conclusion that he had no choice but to put it down or take them all on. Finally, reluctantly, Breslin tossed the bat against a wall where one of the two constables quickly walked over and picked it up. The dealer stood, breathing hard, unperturbed by his nakedness. He was a muscular six-foot tall, in his early thirties, with close-cropped fair hair and a scar under his left eye.

‘Thomas Breslin,’ Narey addressed him. ‘I have a warrant to search these premises and I suggest you put some clothes on. Officers, go with him.’

‘You’ve no fucking right being here,’ roared Breslin. ‘What the fuck is going on?’

‘Where do you want to start?’ replied Narey. ‘Possession with intent to supply? Or should we talk about Melanie? Or rather Una?’

Breslin’s eyebrows knitted over in what could have passed for confusion or being found out but either way it soon manifested itself in aggression. His face contorted in fury and he advanced quickly on Narey until his face was right in hers, his spittle pebble-dashing her forehead as he ranted at her. She waved the male cops back with a quick motion of her arm and stared the man down.

‘The fuck are you talking about?’ he bellowed, his eyes bulging. ‘Coming into my house at this time of the morning. Fuck’s your game?’

‘Something to hide, Mr Breslin?’ Narey remained calm. ‘Was it the mention of Una’s name that bothered you?’

Breslin snarled and took half a step back and pulled his right arm back, ready to throw a punch at her. In a split second, another arm was quickly bent over his and he was forced to the ground with his arm twisted behind his back and a foot placed behind his right knee.

‘I’m impressed,’ Narey admitted. ‘They teach you that at Tulliallan?’

Corrieri looked up at her with a sheepish grin, tightening her hold on Breslin’s arm and being rewarded by a pained grunt from the naked dealer.

‘Evening classes,’ she admitted. ‘Kuk Sool Won and Pilates. I get a discount for doing them both.’

‘Nice work,’ Narey nodded. ‘Mr Breslin, I think we should take a wee trip to the station, don’t you?’

In response, Breslin bitterly spat on his own carpet and let off a string of expletives, most of which were unflattering remarks about female police officers.

Half an hour later, a bristling T-Bone Breslin was parked in a chair inside Stewart Street, glowering at Narey and Corrieri and complaining at the length of time it was taking for his solicitor to get there. The bravado that he’d lost when Corrieri had brought him to his knees had returned along with his aggression.

‘Talk to us anyway, Tommy,’ Narey was telling him.

‘Go fuck yourself, bitch. You should be out on the streets trying to catch the fucker shooting people who are only trying to make a living by providing a service to the community.’

Yes, you’re right, thought Narey, I should. But I’ll settle for cutting your balls off if you’ve done this.

‘I really don’t see why you wouldn’t talk,’ she continued. ‘When did you last see Una?’

‘What the fuck do you keep bringing her up for?’ he shouted.

‘It’s a simple question. When did you last see her?’

‘I don’t fucking know and I’m saying nothing till my lawyer’s here.’

‘You don’t
know
? She’s your girlfriend, right?’

‘None of your fucking business. I’m saying nothing.’

‘And she’s the mother of your daughter, right?’

Anger flashed across his features.

‘Leave my daughter out of this. Out of this!’

‘When did you last see Una?’ Narey persisted.

‘I don’t know. A week ago. Just piss off.’

‘When would that be then? Last Friday? Last Saturday?’

‘Saturday maybe. I don’t remember.’

‘Long time to go without seeing your girlfriend, isn’t it?’

‘She’s a crackhead. She doesn’t know where she is half the time so how am I expected to know?’

‘Long time for your daughter to go without seeing her mother.’

Breslin’s anger flared again and Narey could see his weak spot.

‘Seems to me you don’t care much about that wee girl if you don’t even care where her mother is.’

‘Don’t talk to me about my daughter. I love her, right? You know nothing.’

‘So where is she then? We know she’s not with her mother and we know she’s not in your flat.’

‘She’s with my mother, okay? Fuck all to do with you but she’s with my maw. Leave her out of this. Nothing to do with that skank and fuck all to do with you.’

A vein was pumping furiously on Breslin’s forehead and his anger was ready to boil over. There were one or two more buttons to be pressed though and Narey had her finger poised.

‘See, that’s interesting. That poor girl. An addict for a mother and a violent dealer for a father. I am sure Social Services would be very interested to hear that. What would you say are the chances of them being allowed to keep that child, DC Corrieri?’

‘Roughly zero,’ Corrieri answered impassively.

‘Fuck off,’ Beslin roared.

‘We have a duty to report it,’ Narey continued. ‘Then it’s out of our hands.’

‘You fucking bitch! What do you want?’

‘I want to know when you last saw Una. And I want to know where you were on Saturday night.’

Breslin screwed his eyes tightly shut and let rip a silent scream of frustration.

‘I told you. Saw her last Saturday. She was going out to work.’

‘To work?’ Narey mocked. ‘Okay. So what did you do when she went to work? Did you follow her, make sure she wasn’t pocketing some of the cash that you wanted for yourself?’

‘No.’

‘And you didn’t wonder where she was all that time?’

Breslin shrugged.

‘Did you wonder?’ Narey repeated.

‘She wandered off sometimes,’ he replied. ‘Got off her face in some shithole with some dirty crackhead or other but she always came crawling back for the T-Bone.’

Narey shook her head at him.

‘But she didn’t come crawling back this time, did she?’

With that, she lifted a photograph off the table and turned it over, shoving it in Breslin’s face.

It showed Melanie lying half-naked on the ground with the life choked out of her.

Breslin flinched. Narey couldn’t quite be sure if it was shock at the realization that the girl was dead or at seeing what he’d done. Maybe it was both, the possibility that he had left her there thinking she was alive and would come ‘crawling back’ in her own good time. Either way, shock was all over Breslin’s face until he reined it back into its customary snarl.

‘Where were you last Saturday night around midnight?’ Narey asked him.

‘That’s nothing to do with me,’ he answered, pointing to the photo.

‘Where were you? Last Saturday at midnight?’

‘I didn’t do that. No way you can pin that on me. That slag worked the streets. Any fucker could have done that to her.’

‘I’m sorry for your loss, Breslin. Your anguish is so touching. Once again, where were you on Saturday night?’

‘I was with someone. She can prove that.’

‘Who?’

‘A friend,’ he sneered with a grin that Narey itched to smash off his face.

‘Name?’

‘Suzanne Wright. I was with her all night.’

‘All night?’

He grinned again.

‘All night. They don’t call me T-Bone for nothing. You should try some, bitch.’

‘No thanks. I’d rather stay disease-free if it’s all the same to you. Give us an address for this young “lady”. And you are going nowhere till we check it out.’

‘Oh it’ll check out okay. Suzy’s not going to forget a night with the T-Bone. I’ll be out of here by lunchtime.’

The fear ran through Narey that he would be. If the girl that he had lined up as an alibi said she was with him then he’d be walking free unless they could prove she was lying.

‘Take this piece of shit out of my sight and put him in a cell,’ she muttered to the uniforms waiting at the door. ‘We’ll be seeing him again soon enough. Oh, and Tommy?’

‘Yeah?’ he grinned.

‘I’m just off to make that call to Social Services. Your “maw” isn’t going to be looking after your kid for much longer.’

‘You fucking bitch,’ he screamed, getting to his feet and viciously kicking over the table. ‘I told you what you wanted to know! You can’t do that!’

‘Watch me. Get him the fuck out of here.’

Suzanne Wright, the girl that Tommy Breslin was using as an alibi, also lived in Summerston, just a few streets away from the man that called himself T-Bone. Narey had made sure that Breslin’s one phone call wasn’t to her and was now standing impatiently on Wright’s doorstep in a block of flats in Torrin Road near John Paul Academy. She’d left Julia Corrieri behind in Stewart Street to search the PNC for Una and so had Constable Sandy Murray in tow.

On the third knock, Wright finally wrestled herself away from daytime TV and pulled the door open just enough on the chain to see who her unwelcome visitor was. One look was all she needed to make Narey for a cop and the chain stayed in place.

‘Whit?’

‘Suzanne Wright?’ Narey asked of the pale face below the tousled mop of dyed blonde hair.