Broken Skin

‘I …’ Rickards was going red again. ‘Everyone keeps taking the piss. Ever since that bloody briefing — it’s all innuendo and double entendre and bloody “suits you, sir!” Some bastard’s even been posting condoms through the grille in my locker. I’m bloody sick of it.’

Logan ordered him a pint of lager. ‘Look, if you let them get to you they’ll keep on doing it. They like to get a reaction, that’s all. Come on — one pint’s not going to kill you, is it?’ He took the drinks from the bar and handed Rickards his pint. ‘That’s an order, Constable.’

Rickards cracked a twisted smile. ‘Yes, sir.’

It was quieter outside, standing under the columned portico at the front of the pub, staying out of the wind, waiting for Jackie to pick up the flat’s phone. It rang through to the answering machine, so Logan tried her on her mobile. Ringing and ringing and ringing and …’ Hello?’

‘Hey, we caught him!’

‘What?’ sounding distracted.

‘Sean Morrison, we caught him.’

‘Oh, yeah, I heard on the news. Cool …’

‘We’re in the pub, want to come?’

A pause, then, ‘Oh, no, I can’t — you remember my friend Janette? Her fiance’s just dumped her, she’s in a right state, so I’m kinda stuck.’

‘Oh,’ trying not to sound disappointed, ‘well, that’s OK. Don’t worry about it.’

‘Sorry … Look, don’t wait up for me, I’ve no idea when I’m going to escape. Probably not till late. She’s a nightmare when she gets started.’

A bendy bus thundered past, narrowly missing a barely dressed young woman and her Neanderthal boyfriend. Logan watched them hurling abuse at the driver.

‘Look, she’s coming back from the toilet, gotta go.’

‘OK, I …’ But she’d already hung up.

Logan stood on the top step, looking down at the phone in his hands. Then closed it up and went back inside.

24

First thing Tuesday morning and Logan was in DI Insch’s office, listening to the big man grumble about not getting enough resources to make a murder case against Frank Garvie. They still hadn’t found anywhere he could have taken Jason Fettes to kill him: he didn’t own or rent any other property; wasn’t looking after anywhere for an ageing relative, or a work colleague; and the B amp;B idea was a complete dead end. So all they had was the large black dildo found in Garvie’s closet. Yes it was clarted with DNA, but none of it belonged to Jason Fettes.

The inspector scowled and tore open another family-value-sized bag of jelly babies. ‘The PF’s not happy,’ he said, ripping the head off a little pink infant, ‘says we’re not going to get a conviction without forensic evidence …’ A handful of tiny figures disappeared into Insch’s mouth, to be chewed unhappily. ‘And I’ve got this bloody stupid terrorism thing today. Like I don’t have enough to deal with!’ He dragged a copy of that morning’s ScottishSun from his in-tray and slapped it on the tabletop. MACINTYRE SAYS, ‘I’LL SUE!’, above a photo of the ugly footballer and his well-dressed lawyer, Sandy Moir-Farquharson. COPS CATCH KILLER KID was relegated to a tiny sidebar. ‘Bad enough we get slapped with an injunction for harassing him, but now the raping wee bastard thinks he’s got a case for libel and slander!’ Little flecks of spit sparked in the overhead lights. He ground his teeth, turning a delicate shade of angry scarlet, then stared over Logan’s shoulder at the big framed Mikado poster. Fuming. ‘What about his alibi for Friday night?’

‘I got Rickards to check it out: Macintyre and his fiancee left the pub at nine, went to the takeaway, picked up a chicken chow mein, beef in black bean sauce-’

‘I didn’t ask for the bloody menu!’

‘Sorry, sir. They left the carryout at half nine.’

Insch gave him a grim smile. ‘Nikki Bruce was attacked between midnight and quarter past — plenty of time for the wee shite to get down the road to Dundee and catch her coming out of the nightclub.’

‘Only his fiancee swears he was with her all night. And we’ve got nothing that proves otherwise, so-’

The inspector’s smile vanished. ‘Exactly whose side are you on, Sergeant?’

Logan didn’t answer that and Insch scowled at him, letting an uncomfortable silence grow, before grabbing the Fettes case file off his desk and tossing it across the Formica. ‘I want you to go through everything we seized from Garvie’s flat — find me a connection.’

Rickards was waiting for him in their tiny, makeshift incident room when Logan lurched in, carrying a huge box from the evidence locker. The constable helped him get it up on the desk, eyeing the contents suspiciously. Everything was covered in a patina of black and white fingerprint powder, sealed away in individual evidence bags. Logan pointed at the open box. ‘Need to go through this lot for DI Insch. And before you say anything: I know, OK?’

‘Oh God …’ Rickards pulled out a stack of DVDs with titles like Deutsche Mannliebe and Knechtschaftgummijungen with a lot of half-naked men on them. Some of whom were wearing lederhosen. ‘We’ve not got to watch this lot, have we?’

Logan patted him on the shoulder. ‘Not we, you. I’ve got to go chase up the IB about those servers.’

‘Give us a chance!’ said the middle-aged man in the SKATE OR DIE T-shirt, his desk littered with laptops, mice and scribbled-on Post-it notes. ‘We’re still going through that stuff from the brothel raid. No way we’ll get anywhere near your stuff for at least a week.’

Logan didn’t like the sound of that. ‘What about Dundee — thought they were supposed to be the computer experts.’

That got a shrug. ‘Big fraud case — ETSA four weeks minimum.’

‘ETSA?’

‘Estimated Time Sodding About.’ He picked up an old Biro from his pigsty desk and stuck it in his gob, sooking distractedly. A placebo cigarette.

‘Insch will throw a wobbler if we don’t get this done soon as.’

Skate Or Die swore. ‘Marvellous. Finnie in one ear, Insch in the other. What a bastarding week …’

‘Could you not just take a quick peek?’

‘No! Finnie’s on my neck as it is.’ He pulled the pen from his mouth, automatically flicking nonexistent ash on the floor. ‘Well, maybe … Look, I’ll see what I can do, OK? No promises.’

It was better than nothing.

Nine am and Logan decided it was about time Rickards had a break. He dragged the constable up to the canteen and bought him a cup of tea and a rowie with jam. Both disappeared in record time. ‘You got many more to go?’ asked Logan as Rickards wiped his greasy hands on a paper napkin.

‘Six.’ He pulled off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. ‘Highspeed, hardcore, German gay porn is even less fun than it sounds …’

‘Talking about your personal life again?’ It was DC Rennie, with a croissant and a cup of fancy coffee. He sat down with a grin. ‘Tell you, I was this close-’

‘I’m not gay!’ Rickards jumped to his feet. ‘Fucking hell, what’s wrong with you bastards? You know what? I have more sex in a month than you get all year!’ He leant over the table to poke Rennie in the shoulder, as the whole canteen went quiet. ‘With women! It’s BDSM, OK? Just because you don’t fucking understand it, doesn’t make it gay!’ And then he stormed off.

Rennie sat there with his mouth hanging open, and slowly conversations started back up again. ‘I was only kidding.’

‘Yeah, well … He’s a bit touchy.’

‘You think?’ Rennie ripped a bite out of his croissant and washed it down with a mouthful of coffee. ‘I didn’t mean anything by it. Just taking the piss.’ He stared at the empty doorway. ‘Is he really into all that leather and spanking?’ Rennie grinned. ‘He’s probably on the phone right now to his mates in the