Bain scowled at him. 'What have I told you about that?' 'Sorry. Force of habit.' 'Jimmy Souter: he's Elizabeth Nichol's brother. Their father worked at the Turriff abattoir. Maybe Goulding was right: he's been building up to taking revenge on his sister.' 'What?' 'Mother abandons them; father loses an arm in an industrial accident; Elizabeth gets taken into care and adopted. She got a loving family, he got stuck at home with a violent, alcoholic father.' It hadn't taken long to dig up Daddy Dearest's criminal record: drunk and disorderly, assault, criminal damage, child endangerment, a couple of what they used to call 'domestic incidents' - one involving a frying pan full of bacon fat. It wasn't surprising the mother left. Just a shame she hadn't taken her kids with her. 'And does this Jimmy Souter have prior?' 'We don't know.' This was the bit that Logan wasn't so happy about. 'I can't find him anywhere - chances are he was adopted too, so he'll have a different surname now. I've got Rennie going through all the children's homes in Grampian for any record of him, Elizabeth, or their sister Kelley.' Bain turned and asked Faulds what he thought, but Logan wasn't finished yet:'I did a search on the father: James Souter. He's wasting away in a hospice up the coast, but he still owns a house. It's one of the dilapidated ones that backs onto Alaba Farm Fresh Meats. Number three.' Bain grabbed a phone off the desk and put the call through to Control: they were going now, and they were going mobhanded.
58
Logan put his foot down, doing eighty on the twisting A947 north out of Dyce, lights and sirens blaring. Three vans - all loaded down with firearms-trained officers - two patrol cars and a couple of CID's scabby Vauxhalls, with Logan struggling to keep up at the tail-end of the convoy. Faulds was in the passenger seat, holding on for dear life, while Alec sat in the back, bouncing from side to side like an unattractive ping pong ball. He'd brought a friend with him: someone called 'Mike' from the BBC, there to watch his back when he went in with the firearms team. As if a dozen heavily armed officers wasn't going to be enough protection. They went through Newmachar at full speed, then roared up the windy road to Oldmeldrum, tractors and four- by-fours getting out of their way. Constant radio chatter. Logan turned it down and asked Faulds to put a call through to Control. 'Get them to send someone out to Elizabeth Nichol's place - she might've been in contact with her brother. Tell them they're looking for photo albums, letters, postcards. Anything that might tell us where he lives.' Faulds released his death grip on the dashboard for long enough to pull out his mobile phone. 'Why are we always trying to break the bloody sound barrier?' He punched a couple of numbers into the phone and gave a small squeal as Logan threw the car round the last bend and they hammered into Oldmeldrum, the convoy roaring straight through and out the other side. Past Fyvie, Birkenhills, and Darra without even slowing down, and on to Turriff. The sky was almost black, golden shafts of sunlight spearing through gaps in the heavy cloud, making the little market town glow. They killed the sirens as they passed the swimming pool, just the flashing lights to warn Saturday afternoon shoppers out of the way - not wanting to give Jimmy Souter too much advance warning.
'Kelley?' Heather whispered into the darkness. 'Kelley, can you--' The door creaked open, spilling light into the cell, catching Heather kneeling on the mattress, holding onto the bars. She tried to duck, but it was too late: He was standing in the doorway staring at her, the front of His butcher's apron stained dark red.
