Close to the Bone

At the top of the stairs was a small landing with a row of knee-high cupboards built into the angle of the roof, just visible in the gloom of a filthy Velux window. Two doors led off into what had to be attic bedrooms.

Sim stopped on the top step. ‘Can you smell something? ’

Logan stood where he was, sniffing. Whatever it was, it was sweet: floral. Not heavy enough to be cloying, but completely out of place in a tiny house that was rotting away inside.

He put one gloved hand on the doorknob to the first bedroom, turned, and let it swing open. Inside, a single bed sat against the back wall, the plaster on the coombed ceilings disintegrating, showing the lathe beneath.

Door number two. . The knob turned, but the door stuck. He pushed harder and a ripping noise — like two bits of Velcro being separated — came from around the door frame. Duct tape.

And then the smell fell out of the room on top of them, curdling its way into Logan’s throat and lungs, filling his nose with the stench of spoiled meat. His throat constricted, stomach lurching. ‘Oh Jesus. .’

The room was every bit as tiny as the first, but instead of the single bed, there was a Ring Knot marked out on the floorboards in black wax. The body was male, its stomach and chest bloated with gas, naked skin peppered with green and orange mould — covered in tiny purple slits, all the hair shaved off. Just like Anthony Chung.

Blood made dark pools on the floorboards, disappearing through the cracks. . That must be what made the dark stains on the kitchen ceiling downstairs.

Sim slapped a hand over her mouth and nose. ‘Jeepers!’

Logan hauled the door closed again. Took his phone out with trembling fingers. And called it in.

47

Insch’s dark baritone growled out of the phone. ‘What exactly are you playing at? ’

Logan perched on the end of the garden wall, one hand shielding his eyes from the pale golden sun. ‘I’m kind of in the middle of something, so. .? ’

The Manky Mystery Machine sat on the overgrown gravel drive, its back doors hanging open while white- suited SEB techs humped boxes into the house. A cordon of blue-and-white ‘POLICE’ tape snaked in the breeze. Two patrol cars blocked the rutted track up to the property, Logan’s rusty old Fiat parked behind them in the gateway to a field of luminous-yellow oilseed rape.

‘Do you have any idea how much money it costs to keep a production like this running? Because-’

‘Want to cut to the chase? ’

A pause. ‘You arrested Morgan Mitchell.’

Logan stared up at the slate-coloured clouds. Sighed. ‘I did not arrest her. She assaulted someone.’

‘Let her out.’

‘She assaulted someone.’

‘Logan, it. .’ He took a deep breath. ‘What if I get the other party to drop the charges? ’

‘Don’t think your star will be too happy with that — she did it on purpose so she could spend a night in the cells. I believe the term you used was, “Method-acting nutjobs”? ’

‘I’m haemorrhaging money here, Logan. I can’t afford to have one of my main actresses banged up in Craiginches for a month!’

PC Sim clambered over the barbed-wire fence just beyond the end of the beech hedge, waved at him, then picked her way past the parked patrol cars.

‘Ms Mitchell’s up in front of the Sheriff tomorrow. I’ll see if I can get you an early morning slot.’

‘I’m serious, this is-’

‘It’s the best I can do. She assaulted someone, she got arrested. I’m not bypassing the whole criminal justice system as a favour for you or anyone else.’

Silence.

Sim stopped right in front of him, then picked the little round lumps of stickie geordies from her trouser legs.

‘I didn’t mean you should break the law.’

‘I’ve got to go.’ Logan hung up and stuck the phone away. ‘Well? ’

Sim sighed. ‘You should see their house, it’s huge. Great big kitchen and a built-in machine for making coffee and everything. I had a latte.’

Logan pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Do we have to have “the talk”? ’

‘Husband’s in London on business, but I spoke to the wife and the daughter. Didn’t see anything, didn’t hear anything. The steading faces away from the house, and I checked the views from all the windows — you could hold an orgy in the front garden here and no one would know. As long as you kept the noise down. . Ah.’

Logan opened his eyes again. ‘What? ’

Sim pointed down the track, where a Porsche Cayenne, a Mercedes, and a dented pool car lumped and bumped their way through the potholes. ‘Cavalry’s here.’

Isobel peeled back her white SOC suit’s hood. Her fringe stuck to her shiny forehead, cheeks glowing bright pink as she snapped off her gloves and puffed out a long breath. ‘I’d estimate two, three days at most. In this heat it’s difficult to be sure, but trapped up there with the door and window taped shut. .’ She lowered herself onto the bonnet of the patrol car, rubbing at her pregnant bulge. ‘Pfff. . MO appears identical to the Anthony Chung case.’

DI Leith groaned. A beige plaster stretched across the bridge of his nose, the skin already starting to darken around his eyes where Ding-Dong thumped him one. ‘Like I haven’t got enough on my plate. .’ He dug his hands into his pockets. ‘Well, as Acting DI McRae found the body, I think he should be the one-’

‘Oh no you don’t.’ Logan glanced back over his shoulder, where the duty undertakers were carrying a stainless-steel coffin out through the front door. ‘This is all yours.’ He turned and started down the track. ‘I’ve got a missing police officer to find.’

Sim scurried up behind him. ‘What now? ’

‘Go home. Your shift finished two and a half hours ago.’

‘Peter’s taking the kids to see that new Disney film. They’ll come back full of caffeine and sugar.’ She smiled. ‘I’d rather be hunting down a murderer than deal with that.’

Logan got to the Fiat, pulled out his phone, and called Rennie. ‘Any news? ’

‘Found some loose cannabis in the place out by Rhynie, but other than that: nothing.’

All three houses north-west of Aberdeen and still no sign of Chalmers. And no sign of Agnes Garfield either. . The weaselly little git at Willox and Smith lied to them. ‘Get over to the estate agent’s in Kintore, I want a list of everything they’ve got for sale north of the city.’

‘But they’ll be closed and-’

‘I don’t care if you’ve got to arrest Willox for having a stupid haircut, get me that bloody list.’

Rennie opened the passenger door and slid into the Fiat Punto. Then curled his top lip. ‘What smells in here? ’

Logan stared at him. ‘Did you get the list or not? ’

A grin. ‘Piece of the proverbial.’ He held up an A4-sized magazine, with a photo of Bennachie on it and the words ‘WILLOX amp; SMITH ~ THE PROPER PROPERTY PEOPLE’.

Logan took it and flicked through the photocopied pages.

‘They do one every two weeks. It’s separated into areas, and I got Mr Comb-over to mark everything that’s been on the market for more than six months.’

Which looked like most of them.

He passed the property magazine to Sim in the back. ‘Everything north-east of the city.’