Shatter the Bones

meantime, DCI Finnie, get surveillance organized on Mr Clayton ASAP. If we do decide to take him, I want to know where he is. We reconvene back here in twenty minutes.’

Robert ‘Marley’ was lying on the cell’s blue plastic mattress. The nightshift had obviously confiscated his clothes for forensic analysis, because he was partially dressed in a white paper SOC suit. He’d stripped off the top half, tying the arms around his waist, exposing a broad brown chest and the kind of wash-board abs that didn’t belong on real people. One hand behind his head, the other tucked into the makeshift waistband.

He didn’t look in the least bit worried about being banged up in a holding cell, facing three counts of murder, one of animal cruelty, and skinning Shuggie Webster’s fingers…

And somehow Logan couldn’t work up the enthusiasm to congratulate him on that last one.

Robert Marley looked up from his bed. He’d dyed his hair red and fluorescent orange, as if his head was on fire. ‘The fuck you lookin’ at, mon. I an’ I ain’t some fuckin’ peepshow for whitey.’

Logan slammed the hatch shut.

The Police Custody and Security officer standing next to him in the corridor puffed out her cheeks. ‘Pfff… Don’t let the fake Jamaican accent fool you; heard the pair of them talking last night in broad Mancunian — had to split them up in the end. Probably never been south of London in their lives.’

Logan’s phone rang. He ignored it. ‘They’re up before the Sheriff at half-two. You want me to stick Bobby the Pseudo-Yardie in an interview room?’

He flexed his right hand, feeling the skin pull tight over his swollen knuckles. ‘Not yet.’

‘Want to see the other one? Got him downstairs?’

His phone was ringing again. ‘Hold on,’ He pulled it out. ‘McRae.’

‘LoganDaveGoulding.’ The psychologist pronounced it as if it was all one big Liverpudlian word. ‘I’ve been trying to get in touch with-’

‘You heard about the fire.’ Of course he had, it’d been in all the evening papers.

‘Well, yeah, but I wanted to know how you’re doing. I’m sorry about Samantha.’

Everyone was sorry about Samantha. Every bastard he passed in the corridor was sorry about her, as if that helped.

Logan held the phone against his chest, and turned to the PCSO. ‘Thanks, I’ll get back to you.’

She wandered off, twirling her big bunch of keys like Charlie Chaplin’s cane.

He put the phone back to his ear. ‘…be mad as hell at the bastards.’ A small pause. ‘Look, I’ve got to give a lecture at ten on “pluralism in regard to the self”, but I’m free from eleven if that’s any good?’

Logan stared at the closed cell door. ‘I’m kinda busy right now.’

‘Of course you are: sorting out home insurance, visiting the hospital…?’

He scrubbed a hand across his face. ‘You know, don’t you?’

‘That you’re at work? Well, let’s call it an educated guess. You need time to grieve, Logan.’

‘She’s — not — dead!’

‘It’s not about death, Logan: most times grief’s about change. And I know it’s a cliche, but sometimes it really does help to talk about it. Rant. Shout. Throw things.’ Goulding sighed. ‘You know you’re not alone, so why shut yourself off?’

‘Excuse me, sir…’ The PCSO was back, pulling a gaunt-faced teenager by the arm. ‘Emily here needs a word.’

Emily looked like she needed a meal, and a bath, and to stop shooting heroin into every vein she had. She licked her lips and stared at him. ‘You the copper looking for that Trisha Brown, yeah?’

Logan stuck the phone against his chest. ‘You a friend?’

‘There a reward for, you know, information and that?’

‘Depends on the information.’

She rubbed a hand up and down her needle-tracked arm. ‘You got them Marley fucks in, right?’

‘Why?’

‘They’re going down, right? You’re not gonna let the fuckers out?’

Logan stared at her. ‘What’ve you got?’

Her left leg trembled, as if it wasn’t really connected to the rest of her. ‘You ask them about Trisha?’

‘Why would-’

‘Bob, right? Big ginger-haired darkie bastard. He did this…’ She pulled up her ‘BRITAIN’S NEXT BIG PORN STAR’ T-shirt, showing off a set of xylophone ribs covered in green-and-blue bruising. ‘Fucker said I should be grateful. If I wasn’t careful I’d end up like Trisha Brown.’

Logan stared at the cell door again. Then went back to his phone call. Goulding was still talking. ‘…point being the strong silent type, it’s not-’

‘Speak to you later.’ He hung up. ‘So, you know, do I get a reward or something?’

‘We’ll see…’

‘Whatever you want, it’ll have to wait. We’re swamped.’ The IB tech took off his dusty plastic goggles and wiped them on the tails of his lab coat. He nodded over his shoulder at a stack of blue plastic crates loaded with evidence bags. ‘You got any idea how much drugs Ding-Dong brought in last night? Like Pete Docherty’s bathroom cabinet in here today.’

‘Where’s Elaine?’

‘Ah.’ The tech nodded. ‘Give us a sec…’ He was back two minutes later with a manila folder. He placed it carefully on the light table. ‘I’m off for a cup of tea, or a pee, or something.’ Then backed up, turned around, and walked out of the room.

The lab door closed, leaving Logan alone with half a million pounds’ worth of drugs.

He opened the folder. Inside were the preliminary forensic results from the flat fire. Traces of accelerant in the hall, no fingerprints on the door or letterbox. The DNA result was hidden away at the back: Elaine Drever had been right, they’d swabbed the door and managed to find viable samples.

Logan read the conclusion twice. It didn’t make any sense — they’d run the profile through the database and not made a single match. Not one.

That wasn’t possible. Bob and Jacob Marley were in the cells, they were in the system, their DNA was on file from two murder scenes.

How could there not be a match?

He rammed the results back into the folder and stormed out into the corridor. Elaine Drever’s office was two doors down — he barged in without knocking.

Logan waved the folder at her. ‘Who fucked up?’

The head of the Identification Bureau pursed her lips. ‘Sorry, sir, something’s come up. I’ll have to call you back.’ She hung up. ‘Sergeant McRae, I-’

‘Who was it? Who screwed with the DNA sample?’

A long pause. ‘No one screwed with anything.’

‘Run the match again.’

‘It’s not going to-’

He slammed the folder down on her desk. ‘Run — it — again!’

Elaine Drever stared at him. ‘We did. Six times. Then we went back and redid the samples. Twice. There wasn’t-’

‘Then why didn’t you find a bloody match!’

Her eyes narrowed. ‘Samantha’s one of ours; you really think we’re not doing everything we can to catch the bastards?’ There wasn’t a match. No match. Zero. Whoever did it, they’re not in the database.’

‘They have to be! They-’

‘We’ve been over the scene with a nit comb; we can’t find what isn’t there.’ She picked up folder. ‘You catch the bastard and this’ll convict him. One hundred percent. Not even Hissing Sid could get him off. But whoever did it, they’re not in the system.’