Close to the Bone

15

Clang — the wastepaper basket clattered against the wall and rebounded, spewing napkins, eviscerated crisp packets, chocolate-bar wrappers, and empty Pot Noodle cartons all over the stained carpet tiles of the viewing suite.

DS Chalmers flinched, spinning her chair around, eyes wide. She blinked a couple of times, then took off her headphones. ‘Frightened the living Jesus out of me. . Good job I’ve got excellent bladder control, or it’d be like Niagara Falls in here.’

The viewing suite was even smaller than the downstream monitoring one — jammed into a space barely big enough to qualify as a cupboard with a huge grey security cabinet for police van CCTV hard drives against one wall, and a little wall-mounted work surface on the other. Two sets of AV equipment sat side-by-side on it, grainy footage of Aberdeen flickering away on a pair of tiny flat-screen TVs.

Chalmers sat in front of them, with a stack of ancient-looking VHS cassettes piled up on the work surface beside her.

Logan ran a hand across his eyes. ‘Sorry.’ Then he squatted down, picked up a dead packet of prawn cocktail and dumped it back in the dented bin. Followed it up with a chicken-and-mushroom Pot Noodle carton. ‘Been one of those days.’

‘I’ve been trying to find Agnes Garfield and Anthony Chung on the city-centre CCTV footage from this morning. Which is a complete nightmare. But. .’ She pressed a button on the console, then spun what looked like a volume knob. On the screen, people rushed into rewind, backing rapidly across Union Street as the lights changed. ‘I did manage to track down that cash-machine transaction.’

‘Bloody European Court of Human Rights. No, you can’t do things the sensible way any more, the way they’ve been done for years, now you’ve got to have the scumbag’s slimy lawyer mouthpiece in the room when you interview them. As if the job wasn’t difficult enough as it is.’ He rammed a cheese-and-onion corpse in the bin, then a Mars Bar, pickled-onion Monster Munch, beef-and-tomato. ‘And people wonder why Scotland has a reputation for the unhealthiest diet in Europe. .’

‘Hold on, I’ll get it up.’ She ejected one tape and replaced it with another.

No way he was touching the used hankies with his bare hands. Just because the viewing suite was on the ground floor, right across the corridor from the CCTV room — manned twenty-four hours a day — it didn’t mean some filthy sod wasn’t in here wanking themselves ragged to footage of drunken Friday-night girlies flashing their boobs at the cameras.

He plucked a biro from the desk and used that to hook them into the bin instead.

‘Here we go. .’

Logan looked up to see a queue of three people, distorted by the cash-machine camera’s fisheye lens. First up was a wee man with a hoodie, a leather jacket, and a bobble hat — even though it was the middle of May. Behind him was a woman, looking back over her shoulder every three or four seconds, as if someone might be after her. The person behind her was a dick in a suit, making a big show of checking his watch every fifteen seconds: don’t you know how important I am?

Logan shook his head. ‘It’s the wrong footage. Where’s Anthony Chung? ’

Bobble-hat-and-hoodie took his money and walked away out of shot. Little Miss Nervous took his place.

Chalmers pressed pause. ‘According to the Clydesdale Bank, this is the transaction from Anthony Chung’s debit card. Two hundred and sixty pounds.’

Little Miss Nervous had far too much makeup on, ginger hair exploding out from underneath a baseball cap with ‘Witchfire’ embroidered into it. Her heart-shaped face was slightly out of focus, the layers of mascara and black eye-shadow giving her eyes a serious Tim Burton vibe.

Logan frowned at the screen. ‘Is that-’

‘She’s dyed her hair, the glasses have gone, and she’s lost a bit of weight, but it’s definitely her.’

Agnes Garfield.

‘What’s she doing with Anthony Chung’s debit card? ’

Chalmers pressed play. ‘Getting some cash out for him? Maybe she’s got none of her own, so they’re living off his? ’

‘Two hundred and sixty’s a lot of cash to get out at one time. They’re going somewhere, or buying something big. .’

‘Not enough for plane tickets, too much for train tickets. And if she was clearing his account out, why not withdraw the full three hundred? Bank says he’s still got another three and a half grand.’

Logan dumped the biro in the bin with the suspicious tissues. ‘Two sixty would buy you a reasonable quantity of weed. She left hers at home.’

‘We followed her through the CCTV from Markies, Union Street, Schoolhill, then she disappears down some steps beside the theatre. There’s nothing else on camera.’

‘GSM trace? ’

She flashed her teeth in a quick grimace. ‘Sorry, Guv, we’re getting nothing on Anthony or Agnes’s phone. They’ve either got their mobiles switched off, they’re out of battery, or they’ve ditched them. Control are keeping an eye on it — if there’s any activity they’ll let us know.’

So much for a quick and easy result. ‘Anthony Chung: he’s got a car, hasn’t he? ’

‘Nissan Skyline. The insurance must be costing his parents a fortune.’

‘Get a lookout request on it.’ Logan nudged the wastepaper basket back where it came from. Just have to do this the old-fashioned way. ‘Right, someone’s got to know where they’re staying, so-’

‘I’ve put together a list of Agnes and Anthony’s friends.’ She flipped open her notebook and held it out. The page was covered with names and addresses. ‘And I’ve booked out a pool car for the rest of the day.’

He smiled. ‘Then let’s go see who’s in the mood for squealing.’

‘Yeah, we were like, you know, completely best friends.’ Dan Fisher leaned against the countertop, stringy tattooed arms poking out from the short sleeves of his crumpled shirt with the pub’s name embroidered onto it. ‘Ton and me was like. . Han and Chewie, right? ’

‘Were? ’ Logan settled onto the bar stool. ‘Past tense? ’

‘Yeah. .’ A shrug. The lobe of Dan’s left ear was stretched around a hollow cylinder, big enough to poke a tube of Smarties through. Three silver hoops above that, one more through his nose, and a stud in his bottom lip like a metal cold sore. Black hair, collar-length on one side and shaved to the scalp on the other. ‘We kinda fell out a bit. You know, with Rowan and everything. He was all,’ Dan put on a broad American accent, cranking up the volume, ‘“She’s a Goddamned nympho in the sack, you ain’t gonna believe what she did last night. .” Always boasting, and I. .’ He bit his bottom lip. ‘I didn’t think he should treat her like that.’

Chalmers flipped to the next page in her notebook, pen at the ready. ‘Rowan? ’

A nod. ‘Yeah, she doesn’t like being called Agnes. Can’t blame her, right? Stupid name.’

‘And that’s why you fell out with Anthony Chung? ’

Dan pulled out a smartphone and poked at it for a moment, then held it out. Grainy camera footage flickered across the screen. A group of young men and women in a pub somewhere, everything stained satsuma orange by the indoor lighting. Laughter crackled out of the little speaker, and the picture moved in on a couple snogging in the corner of the booth. His hair was longer than hers, black and shiny, hers was brown, wavy, pulled back in a ponytail. He slipped a hand up the front of her T-shirt. And then the kissing stopped and she jerked away from him.

It was Agnes Garfield, though not as pretty in pixelvision as she was in the ‘HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WOMAN? ’ posters. ‘Damnit, you’ve got to let it heal!’ She slapped him hard enough to make his sunglasses fly off. ‘Bastard!’ And then she was off, shoving out of the booth and stomping out of shot.

Silence. Then the guy picked up his glasses and hurried after her. ‘Rowan, please, come on, I didn’t mean it. .’ Everyone else laughed.

Dan pressed stop, then put the phone away. ‘Only just had it pierced.’

‘And that was a regular occurrence.’

‘At least twice a week. She’s a great girl. Bit screwed up, but she completely dotes on him — even though he treats her like crap. Screwing around behind her back, pissed and stoned all the time, telling her it’s her fault and she makes him do it. And she just takes it, forgives him, lets him get away with it.’ Dan fiddled with the big hole in his ear. ‘You know what happened on Valentine’s Day? He made her get his name tattooed on her thigh. I mean, tattoos are cool and everything, but he was just marking his territory, right? Can you believe that? Wanker.’ Dan coiled one hand into a fist. ‘But she doesn’t see it, you can’t talk to her any more. .’

Logan took a sip of his water. ‘So you fought.’

‘Yeah. .’ Dan opened his mouth, stuck a finger under his top lip and lifted, showing off a gap where a tooth should have been. ‘Got in a couple of decent punches, but Ton’s like a bloody ninja, isn’t he? ’

‘And let me guess, Agnes wasn’t exactly grateful you’d stood up for her? ’

‘Came round that night and kneed me in the nads.’ He looked off down the bar, where a pair of huge women were bellowing out Sid James laughs, cleavage all a-wobble. ‘How could she let him treat her like that, you know? I would’ve looked after her. .’

‘. .at it like, I dunno, just arguments and fights and that.’ Clive McWilliams took a long drag on his cigarette, then oozed it out in a slow breath. Smoke curled in the thick moustache and ludicrously long goatee beard. He couldn’t have been much older than nineteen, but he had the facial hair of a Victorian industrialist. The muscle shirt was smeared with blood, as was the black apron and the white wellington boots. ‘She just. . you know, gets under his skin.’

‘And he beats her.’

‘Nah, it was never physical, they’re just that kind of couple. Like to fight. Like to make up. Course, I wouldn’t blame him if he gave her a slap now and then: she won’t shut up sometimes. Other times she just sits there staring at him like he’s Jesus or something. You know? ’

The smell of old fish and spilled diesel wafted across the quay. Off in the middle distance three massive seagulls were fighting over a cod’s head, screaming at each other as they swooped and dived.

‘And are the fights worse when he drinks? ’

‘Nah. . Well, you wouldn’t be able to tell, ’cos he never stops drinking.’

Chalmers looked up from her notebook. ‘What about when he takes drugs? ’

‘What, weed? ’ A laugh. Then the last smouldering stub of cigarette pinged out over the edge of the quay and into the rainbow-filmed water. ‘Not exactly drugs, is it? Just a bit of mother nature’s finest to help a body unwind. God knows where he gets it from, but it’s mint. .’ Clive’s mouth clamped shut, he rolled his shoulders forward, looked off into the middle distance. ‘Not that I would know anything about that, Officers.’

‘Any idea where they’re staying? ’

Clive rubbed his hands down his bloody shirt, then dug a hairnet out of his apron and pulled it on. ‘No idea. But wherever it is, she’s probably winding him up something chronic.’

‘. .and I mean seriously loopy.’ Penny Cooper sucked at her teeth for a bit, staring up over Logan’s shoulder at the secur-ity monitor mounted above the whiteboard. Then she sighed, broad shoulders moving beneath the black T-shirt. Enough gel in her ash-blonde hair to make her look like an electrocuted Jedward. ‘OK, she’s pretty enough, if you like that whole brash perky look-at-my-boobs thing, but still. . Welcome to Freaktown, population: Agnes.’

The bookshop staff room smelled of stale kebab and onions, the microwave buzzzzzzing away to itself on the countertop. Breezeblock walls painted white, and covered with posters for kids’ books and serial-killer thrillers.

Penny peered through the microwave door. ‘Always takes forever, doesn’t it? ’

‘Do you have any idea where they might have gone? ’

‘He’s been banging Stacey the whole time, and Agnes still won’t take the hint. Tell you, I lost count of the times Ton’s tried to ditch her, but she’d just turn up the next day with a litre of voddy and a six-pack of Stella, and that would be that. This one time, he dumped her right before Valentine’s Day and she went out and got his name tattooed right on her thigh. How weird would you have to be? ’

Logan glanced over at Chalmers: still scribbling away in her notebook.

‘So you’re saying he’s a heavy drinker? ’

‘Agnes the nutter drove him to it. Always burbling on about Harry Bloody Potter and Twilight, and that stupid Witchfire book. Seriously, what is she, six? ’

Duncan Cocker’s cigarette sent a smoke signal into the vivid blue sky. ‘Yeah. . dunno, really.’ He leaned back against the grey harled wall and loosened his tie, tucking the pile of house schedules under one arm. ‘They’re kinda. .’ A shrug rearranged the creases on his cheap grey suit, the fabric thin and shiny, like its owner. ‘You know? ’

Not even vaguely.

The back garden was big enough for a swing set, a slide, and a Wendy house that looked as if it’d been built by a drunken chimpanzee. Lichen flecked the patio slabs. A gas barbecue and a set of plastic furniture lay abandoned in the middle of the grass.

Off in the middle distance, a tractor rumbled along the edge of a field. Rapeseed flowers glowed violent yellow, as if someone had taken a highlighter pen to the landscape. A pigeon whrrrrooooed in the thick leylandii hedge.

All very bucolic.

Logan shaded his eyes against the sun. ‘So he drank, he smoked dope, and he dumped her? ’

‘Well. . they were always doing that. Storming out, “I’ll never speak to you again, you lying bastard.” “Screw you, you mental bitch.” And next thing you know they’re tying each other’s tonsils in knots with their tongues. Even when he’s cheating on her.’

Chalmers stopped scribbling in her notebook and stared at him. ‘And Agnes is OK with that? ’

‘Oh, she makes him pay for it, but basically: if Ton’s happy with it, she is too. Tell you, he’s had dogs less loyal than her, and I’m talking Alsatians.’ Duncan made a little circular motion with the tip of his cigarette. ‘You hear about her tattoo? ’

‘And you’re sure they’ve not been in contact? No missed calls, or texts? ’

‘Nah. Ton’s like that though: man of mystery. Doesn’t like being pinned down.’ Duncan checked his watch, took another puff. ‘Bastards should be here by now. Got another couple to show round at half two.’

Logan moved across the patio, so the sun was warm against his back and not blazing in his eyes. ‘Any idea where they’d go? Ever talk about escaping somewhere else? Down south, maybe? ’

A frown creased Duncan’s thin face. Then he swept a hand outwards at the fields and trees. ‘Why’d you want to escape all this? It’s, like the best place in the world.’

‘They never talked about leaving Aberdeen? ’

‘Sometimes, when he’s stoned, Ton bangs on about how great San Francisco is, but. .’ Duncan leaned forward and dropped his voice to a whisper. ‘There were some Chinatown Triad guys after him: that’s why his mum and dad had to pack up and do a runner over here. The way Ton tells it, there’s this big gunfight behind some restaurant and he caps two of them, but they get his cousin. Bang, right between the eyes.’

Chalmers moved a step closer. ‘He told you he killed two people in San Francisco? ’

‘Pffff. . Nah, shot them in the leg and that. Totally self-defence.’

‘And you believed him? ’

‘Yeah, well. . Ton’s my main man, you know? ’ Duncan shifted the schedules from one armpit to the other. ‘Don’t know what I’m gonna do if he don’t come back.’

Logan passed the brown paper bag over, then settled down on the bench. Sunlight beat down against his cheeks, the sharp salty tang of the sea mingling with fresh-cut grass. Three huge offshore supply vessels were lined up a mile from shore, probably waiting their turn to slip into harbour.

The grass dropped off in a steep incline down to a tarmac path, then a railing, then another steep drop — concrete this time, then a wide strip of pale-gold sand. A mother lumbered along it, following a pair of wee girls that giggled their way to the water’s edge, then scurried away squealing as the waves tried to eat their bare toes.

Chalmers rummaged about inside the bag and came out with a couple of fries. ‘Thanks.’

‘Did you notice? ’

She chewed, swallowed. ‘They’re a pair of nutjobs and they deserve each other? ’

‘Apart from that.’ Logan unwrapped his cheeseburger and took a bite. Talking as he chewed. ‘No one mentioned Agnes taking drugs. It was all him.’

‘Her dad did.’

‘Yes, but did he actually see her do it? Or did he just smell the marijuana on her? Maybe the weed was in her house because she was holding it for her boyfriend.’

‘Her boyfriend the complete scumbag.’ An onion ring disappeared in two goes. ‘He gets high all the time, plastered too, he cheats on her, and she’s still running around after him like a lovesick puppy. .’ More fries. ‘Makes you vomit, doesn’t it? ’

‘Takes all sorts.’ Another bite of burger. Chewing, staring out at the glittering blue sea. ‘We need to chase down this Stacey he was seeing on the side. Might still be at it.’

One of the wee girls turned to run away from the North Sea again, tripped, went sprawling on her face in the sand, and was swallowed by a tiny wave. Cue screaming and bawling.

Logan helped himself to one of Chalmers’s onion rings. ‘Why are they hanging about Aberdeen, though? If you’re going to run away, you run away, you don’t stay in the same place where people are going to recognize you. .’ He dipped a couple of chips into a dollop of mayonnaise. ‘What about the diary? ’

‘Next on my to-do list. Spent most of the morning going through CCTV footage.’ Chalmers tore the top off a sachet of salt and sprinkled it into her brown paper bag. ‘When I was little, Dad would load us all in the car and down we’d come from Inverness for a long weekend during summer holidays. Play on the beach. Go to Duthie Park. Eat ice cream and rowies.’

‘Maybe they’re not running away at all. Maybe they’re hiding? ’

‘Do they still have that petting zoo out by Hazlehead? ’

‘What if Anthony Chung isn’t just into smoking dope? What if he’s been selling it too? ’

Chalmers stuffed more fries into her mouth. ‘I used to love the llamas. Like mutant sheep on steroids.’

‘Run a PNC on the pair of them when we get back to the station.’

‘Already did it.’ She sooked her fingers clean, then pulled out her notebook and thumbed through the pages. ‘Here we are: Anthony Chung, done for drunk and disorderly behaviour twice, no jail time, just fines. One charge of driving without a valid tax disc. Two warnings for possession of a controlled substance, but they didn’t find enough weed to do him for intent to supply.’

‘Agnes? ’

‘Choirgirl, compared to him. She was given a warning the week before she went missing — local production company filed a complaint about her breaking into their film studio. A Mr Alexander Clark from ClarkRig Training-’

‘Wait: Alexander Clark. Zander Clark? ’

‘His name’s on the complaint. They had to get security to eject her three times, then she broke in.’

‘Why was she breaking into a porn studio? ’