Flesh House

McInnis straightened up and ran his torchlight across the rain-hammered night. There was no way they could leave her alone out here in the dark while they went after the Flesher. 'Son of a rancid bitch.' The bastard had got away.

53

'Who stinks like a brewery?' DI Steel, turned in her seat to sniff at Logan. 'You bathe in beer this morning?' The briefing room was full, everyone waiting for DCS Bain to turn up and hand out the morning assignments. Up till now the discussion had been exclusively Flesher-related: speculation and rumour leaving reality far behind as the tale of PC McInnis's clash with Aberdeen's most notorious serial killer was told and retold. Logan pointed at the green-faced constable sitting next to him. 'That's Rennie you can smell. He went for the world record vodka-and-Red-Bull-get-pissed-quick-athon last night.' 'Oh, aye?' The inspector grinned. 'And there was me thinking our wee boy looked like shite'cos he'd been up all night shagging Luscious Laura.' Rennie went pale, and then bright red. 'Not feeling too good.' 'If you're going to puke, do it in that direction: Laz's suit needs a good clean, he won't mind.' 'No one's being sick on anyone. We--' Logan sat up straight. 'Look out: Bain.' The Detective Chief Superintendent had finally appeared - Faulds, the ACC, the Procurator Fiscal, and the DCI from Strathclyde following on behind. The room fell silent. 'Right,' said Bain, nodding to a constable who killed the lights,'Elizabeth Nichol.' A face appeared on the screen behind him - middle aged, bleached blonde hair with grey-flecked roots beginning to show, her face a patchwork of bruises. 'Alpha Nine Three discovered her less than two hundred yards from the body of Vicky Young.' Click and the photo changed: night time, a woman in bloodstained underwear lying face down beneath a gorse bush, the skin tones bleached out by the photographer's flash. 'Her throat was cut through to the bone, she was nearly decapitated.' Click and they were looking at a kitchen table covered with bits of human body. 'Marcus Young.' Click - a severed head, lying under the table. Click - back to the battered, terrified face of Elizabeth Nichol. Bain picked up a stack of paper from the desk beside him and handed it to the nearest constable, telling him to take one and pass the rest on. 'This is the preliminary victimology report on our survivor.' Logan accepted the pile from a queasy-looking Rennie and handed it on to Steel. According to the cover sheet, the Family Liaison officer they'd assigned Elizabeth Nichol was the same one he'd taken to see Andrew McFarlane: PC Munro. 'Read it later,' said Bain. 'The gist is that Nichol went to the Youngs' house to borrow a cookery book. Mrs Young was out shopping, but her husband asked Nichol in to wait. She says the doorbell went fifteen minutes later and when Young went to answer the door he was forced back into the hall and beaten. Nichol panicked and ran.' 'Not bloody surprising,' muttered Steel. If the Chief Superintendent heard her, he wasn't letting on. 'Next thing she knows, she's wandering round the waste ground at the back of the houses in the rain. She comes across Vicky Young's body and is accosted by a man fitting the Flesher's description. They struggle, but Alpha Nine Three turns up and she manages to escape. PC McInnis found her hiding in a whin bush. Her clothes were torn and covered in blood.'