CRACK. And her head was bounced off the floor again. Justin ... A spark went off in the middle of her head. JUSTIN! She had to save Justin! She had to get up right now and-- Black. --right now. GET UP! She struggled and something heavy landed on her chest. Focus! Get up! Justin needs-- Hands wrapped round her throat and squeezed. She tried to fight back, to pull the hands away, but they were too strong. They-- Black. --Eyes, go for the eyes! She clawed at her killer's face, but it was smooth, hard. The eyes just holes into nothingness. The thing had no eyes! The thing-- Black. --NO! Justin needed her! Heather flung a hand out, fumbling across the terracotta tiles. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Tin! A tin of soup! She grabbed it and swung with all her might. But her fingers wouldn't work. The can barely moved. It rolled off quietly to lie beside Duncan's foot. The world got darker, and darker, and darker, and-- Black ...
5
DI Insch looked like an over-inflated marshmallow in his white SOC oversuit. He pretty much filled the tiny lounge on his own, leaving Faulds to perch on the edge of a creaky sofa, while the Identification Bureau finished up in the kitchen. It was only a tiny house in Fittie, but it was stuffed with police photographers, IB technicians, and fingerprint specialists - turning a crime scene into a disaster area. Logan dug out his notebook. 'Door-to-door turned up nothing - no one saw anyone coming or going from the house last night. Closest we've got are the next-door neighbours: they heard the kid, Justin, crying from about three o'clock this morning. When he hadn't stopped by noon they tried the doorbell. No reply. They've got a key in case of emergencies so they let themselves in ...' Logan's gaze drifted past the inspector's bulk to the blood-spattered kitchen. 'No sign of Mr or Mrs Inglis, but Justin was upstairs in his room. He'd barricaded himself in with a rocking chair and his toy box.' Faulds picked a silver photo frame off the mantelpiece: mother and child grinning at the camera, the not-so- golden sands of Aberdeen beach stretching away behind them. 'They didn't hear anything last night?' 'Neighbours say the Inglises weren't exactly the most stable of couples. They'd be OK for a couple of months, then they'd go ballistic at one another. Throw things, screaming rows - usually about money - she put him in hospital once with concussion.' 'Hmm ... so we
