Dark Blood

house again.

Tony wanders over to the window of the room they’ve rented in the same hotel as that tit Danby. Place is nice enough, if you like tartan. He hauls up the net curtains, letting in the view: skeletal trees scratching at the grey sky, some sort of park sunken way below street level, a railway line, a dual carriageway, a bunch of granite buildings…Grey, grey, grey. Like no bugger ever invented colour.

Snowing again too.

‘Well?’ Neil’s lying on the double bed, feet dangling over the edge so Julie doesn’t shout at him for putting his shoes on the covers. ‘What’s the plan now, then?’

Tony sniffs. ‘Need to find out where they’re moving him to.’

Julie doesn’t even look up. ‘Sweetheart, where would we be without your lightning-sharp intelligence?’

‘Only saying.’

And it’s razor sharp, not lightning. But Tony’s lightning-sharp enough to keep his mouth shut.

Neil yawns. ‘We still going after Danby the night?’

‘I’d love to, Babe, but Danby’s useless without Knox.’ She frowns at the TV. ‘Supposed to pick them both up at the same time, can’t do that if we don’t know where Knox is.’

‘Maybe he’ll phone, like?’

Tony settles back on the windowsill. ‘Might not get the chance. They’ll be keeping him under the thumb till things calm down.’

‘Doesn’t stop us grabbing Danby, does it?’

Julie sighs. ‘If we grab Danby first they’ll know something’s up. Knox’ll be locked up tighter than a Scotsman’s wallet.’

A vacuum cleaner rumbles down the corridor outside, someone whistling along to a pop tune Tony almost recognizes as it goes by. On the TV the local plod bundle a quilt-covered figure into the back of a police van.

Julie pulls on a scuffed tan cowboy boot, the drug dealer’s blood all washed away. ‘OK, new plan: if we don’t hear from Knox, we just have to stick with Danby. Sooner or later he’s going to lead us right to him. Bish, bash, and indeed: bosh.’

Tony sticks up his hand. ‘Bags not first to trail Danby.’

Julie: ‘Second.’

Too slow off the mark, all Neil can do is lie there looking out at the snow. ‘Ah…fuck.’

31

Logan waved a thank you to the patrol car and struggled through the snow, up the slippery steps, across the front podium — brown with sand and salt — and in through the front doors of FHQ.

Big Gary was sitting behind the reception desk, his head propped up with one hand, a battered paperback lying on the desk in front of him.

‘Any messages?’

The big man reached beneath the desk and thumped a pile of Post-its on the counter. Never even took his eyes off the page.

‘Anything important?’

‘I’m reading.’

Logan flipped through the stack of yellow stickies. ‘Rennie, Rennie, Beattie, Rennie, Beattie…’ These went in the ‘when hell freezes over’ pile — there was no way Logan was talking to DI Beardy Beattie until Dildo called back. And he’d still not forgiven Rennie for grabbing Samantha’s bum.

Then there were a couple of burglary victims looking for an update; someone wanting to know why no one had found his missing Mercedes yet; a woman from the Independentwanting an interview about Knox, another complaint from Douglas Walker’s idiot lawyer, and right at the bottom, one from DI Steel.

A summons to her office.

He stuck the Post-its back on the desk. ‘Any idea what Steel’s after?’

Big Gary sighed, his jowls inflating and deflating like a pair of ruptured space hoppers. He marked his page with a Curly Wurly wrapper, then slammed the book shut. ‘Why can’t you buggers leave me alone for five minutes?’

Logan stared at him. ‘Sorry for interrupting your reading time, Gary. My apologies, mate, I thought you were manning the sodding desk.’

The sergeant narrowed his eyes. ‘Meant to be on my break, but that useless tit Jordan’s still in the bog.’ He narrowed his eyes. ‘Where’s that PC I sent you off with?’

‘Butler? Left her up at A amp;E watching a used-car dealer.’

‘For how long?’

Shrug. ‘Till the doctors give us the all clear to bang him up.’

‘Oh for…’ Big Gary pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘How am I supposed to manage resources if you buggers in CID treat Uniform as your own personal property?’

‘You really are in a foul sodding mood today, aren’t you? Not my fault Jordan’s got the squits.’

The desk sergeant scowled, then made a big show of opening his book again. ‘And you better get back to that wee shite Barrett.’ Big Gary’s voice jumped an octave and went all nasal, ‘of McGilvery, Barrett, and McGilvery.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Says it’s a disgrace his poor wee client’s been kept in over the weekend waiting for his shot in front of the Sheriff.’

‘Then his client shouldn’t be circulating forged twenties, should he?’ Logan rearranged all the Post-its back into a single stack. ‘When’s he up?’

Big Gary checked the charge book. ‘Court One at two fifty.’

Logan checked his watch. ‘Just enough time to have another crack at him.’

Douglas Walker slumped over the interview room table, the fingers of one hand wrapping themselves through his unwashed, greasy hair. Twisting it into little curls, then letting them go again. The fibreglass cast on the other arm lay flat against the chipped Formica. He smelled of stale sweat, overlaid with something sour.

Logan glanced up at the camera bolted to the wall, watching the little red light winking. ‘Come on, Douglas: you’re up in front of Sheriff McNab in twenty minutes. Sure you don’t want me to put in a good word for you?’

‘Lawyer.’

It was the only thing he’d say: ‘Lawyer.’

State your name for the tape. ‘Lawyer.’

Do you know why you’re here? ‘Lawyer.’

Would you like a cup of tea? ‘Lawyer.’

‘Let me paint a little picture for you, Douglas. What’s going to happen is that your idiot lawyer, Captain Baldy the Estate Agent, is going to stand up at ten to three and waffle for a bit about criminal law — which he knows sod all about — and then Sheriff McNab — who’s an utter bastard — will ask how you plead.’

Douglas Walker just kept on playing with his hair.

‘Your lawyer will make you plead “not guilty”, even though we all know you are, and then McNab’ll set bail.’ Logan smiled. ‘And that’s where it gets interesting. If you can’t make bail, you end up in Craiginches for six or seven weeks, till the trial date. If you can, you’re out on the street for tea time; then the press harassment starts. They camp outside your house, take photos, talk to neighbours-’

Douglas’s head snapped up.

‘Think how proud your mum and dad are going to be when they get back from holiday!’

The young man fidgeted with the rim of his cast, tugging little bobbles out of the tube-bandage lining. ‘They…They can’t put my name in the papers. I’ll sue!’

‘For what?’

‘I don’t know. Defamation of character! Slander. Libel, whichever one it is. They can’t-’