this lot up.' 'Ha.' Rennie poked the two box files sitting beside his desk. 'Going to take a shit-load longer than that: INTERPOL's a bloody nightmare. I stuck a notice up on I-24/7 three days ago and I'm bloody swamped. Scared to open my email now ...' He sighed. 'And Ann Summers was out of chocolate body paint so we used golden syrup instead. Tell you, there are still bits of me--' 'I don't want to know.' Logan handed the INTERPOL reports back. 'Enter the lot into HOLMES, get it to look for patterns.' 'That'll take ages ...' 'You want Insch to rip off your sticky bits? Didn't think so.' Logan hung his jacket on the back of the chair. 'Any word from Fingerprints?' 'Message on your desk.' It looked more like an ordinance survey map than a fingerprint, but according to the accompanying notes there were over sixty points of correlation between the print they'd lifted from one of the empty Special Brew tins and Ken Wiseman's right thumb. He'd definitely been at the house. DI Steel threw the printouts back at Logan, collapsed into her chair and told him to close the door so she could have a fag. Her office was a tip, covered in stacks of paperwork and half-empty cups of tea. 'Tell you,' she said, cracking the window open and lighting up,'twenty years ago nearly every DI kept a big bottle of duty free in their desk for moments like this. What have I got?' She went rummaging. 'Two packets of breath mints and a dirty magazine. And it's no' even mine!' She sent a stream of smoke billowing towards the open window. 'The CC's no' exactly happy we missed Wiseman.' 'Not as if we could have done anything about it though, is it - if he sodded off before we found out about the place?' 'Aye, well, I said the same thing and he went off on one about excuses no' being good enough for the victims or their families.' She picked up the copy of Bondage World and flicked through it half- heartedly. Then dropped it in the bin. 'Where the hell is he?' 'We could try going through all the abandoned properties Wiseman's sister had keys for. He's obviously not worried about sleeping rough with--' 'This may come as a shock, but I did actually think of that. Wiseman's sister went missing, what: fifteen, sixteen years ago?' 'Eighteen.' 'You think anyone's going to remember what bloody houses she had keys for eighteen years ago? ' Steel ran a hand through her devil-may-care hair. 'No wonder Inspector Fatty went loopy, this sodding case is impossible.' Logan watched her wallow in self-pity for a minute, then asked,'You were in Aberdeen twenty years ago, right?' The inspector took the cigarette out of her mouth and winked at him. 'I know, hard to believe, what with me being so young and attractive looking.' 'You work the first Flesher case?' 'Nope.' 'Ever work with a DI Brooks?'
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