Dark Blood

25

The toilet door creaked open on a dark room.

Blink. Bzzzzzzzz. Blink.

The fluorescent lamp never got past the start-up phase, sending out little flashes of dim light.

Bzzzzzzzz. Blink. Blink. Bzzzzzzzz.

A short, stainless steel trough ran along one wall, the tiles beneath them shiny with poor targeting. Two graffiti-scrawled cubicles, one with the door missing. Toilet seat was gone too, and there was no way you’d want to expose your bare bum to whatever lurked in the bowl.

The drip, drip, drip of water in the cistern above the urinal made a dark heartbeat in the gloom.

Blink. Bzzzzzzzz. Blink.

Logan stepped into the eye-biting nip of old urine and let the door swing shut behind him. ‘Jesus, Pete, when did you last clean this place…?’

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Bzzzzzzzz. Blink. Bzzzzzzzz.

It was like standing in the middle of a horror movie.

‘Come on, Angus, I know you’re in here.’

Pale orange light oozed in through dirty windows, slowly bringing the shapes back into focus. The door to the second cubicle was closed. Not wanting to touch anything, Logan raised his foot and gave it a shove.

Locked.

Blink. Bzzzzzzzz. Blink. Blink.

‘Daz?’ He tapped the graffiti-covered chipboard with the toe of his shoe. ‘That better not be you in there having a wank…’

Silence.

Logan pulled back his foot and gave the door a kick, springing the lock. The boom reverberated around the narrow, stinking room. Someone gave a little yelp.

Whoever it was, they’d managed to get their top half out of the narrow window above the toilet, one foot on the cistern, the other waving about in the air, backside wiggling, rucksack stuck in the small opening.

‘Angus?’

The thrashing stopped. Then started again, feet swinging about madly.

Logan crossed his arms and only just stopped himself from settling against the cubicle wall. ‘It’s OK, take your time.’

The legs went limp. Then started up again.

‘Should have taken the backpack off before you tried to sneak out the window.’

A muffled, ‘Fuck…’ One last kick, then everything sagged. ‘I’m stuck.’

‘Really?’

‘Er…How about we cut a deal?’

‘Sorry Angus, it’s against Grampian Police policy to negotiate with people’s backsides. What’s in the rucksack?’

Pause. ‘Stuff?’

‘You put Danny Saunders in touch with two loan sharks.’

‘Er…I…I’m getting snowed on.’

‘Pair of blokes called Gallagher and Yates.’

Another bout of wriggling. ‘I’m catching my death out here!’

‘Good. Now tell me about Gallagher and Yates.’

‘This is police brutality…Can I at least come in out the snow?’

‘No. Talk.’

‘Fucking CID.’ Sigh. ‘They’re new boys, OK? Pair of big bastards up from Edinburgh looking for investment opportunities. You know?’

‘Who do they work for?’

‘I…Look, I’m losing all sensation in my arms here.’

‘Come on, Angus: are these guys freelance, or part of someone’s crew?’

‘I don’t-’

‘Where can I find them?’

Silence.

Fine. Be like that.

Logan grabbed both of Angus’s ankles and pulled.

‘FUCK!’ He came clattering back into the cubicle, hands grabbing at the window frame. A skinny wee man with a face that was all nose and no chin. His legs scrabbled, but Logan wouldn’t let go.

‘Where do I find them, Angus?’

‘Aaagh, I’m-’ And then he fell, bashing his face on the top of the cistern. One hand hauling the toilet roll dispenser off the wall.

Logan let go of Angus’s legs and the man tumbled to the cubicle floor, groaning, swearing.

‘Aw…fuck, my head!’ Pause. Swear. Moan. ‘Urgh, it’s all damp down here!’

Logan hauled the rucksack off him, before it got covered in whatever was all over the floor. ‘You want to stay here, rolling about in it, or you want to go back to the bar?’

They took their drinks into the snug, a tiny room at the back of the bar, just big enough for two bench seats, a small table, and some dark-red wallpaper. It was like sitting in a blood clot.

Angus sniffed at his jacket sleeve, grimaced, then scoofed down a mouthful of dark brown beer. ‘Covered in pish…’ The left side of his forehead was already swelling up, a thin smear of blood oozing out onto his pale face.

Logan squeezed into the seat opposite and handed him a damp bar towel with a couple of ice cubes folded in the middle. ‘Try this.’

Angus dabbed at his smelly sleeve.

‘It’s for your head, you idiot.’

‘Oh…’ He pressed it against his lump. Winced. Squinted. Took another mouthful of beer. ‘I should sue.’

‘For what? You were breaking and entering.’

‘I wasn’t entering, I was exiting. Since when was breaking and exiting a-’

‘Why don’t we take a wee peek in your rucksack?’ Logan flipped open the plastic toggles, then upended the contents on the little table. About a dozen iPod Nanos, still in their boxes; perfume gift sets from Dior and Gucci; a couple of fancy-packaged hair straighteners.

‘I got receipts for all that, honest.’

There was something wedged in the bottom of the rucksack. Logan gave the whole thing a shake, and a small padded envelope — about the size of a paperback book — thunked onto the pile of merchandise.

Angus groaned. ‘I’ve no idea how that got there.’

‘Sure you don’t.’ Logan flipped the envelope over: it was from Amazon.co.uk, addressed to ‘MR THOMAS BLACK.’

‘Maybe…’ Cough. ‘It…You like music? Cos I got more iPods than I really need for Christmas, and you could-’

‘Don’t be an idiot.’ Logan winkled the flap open and upended the envelope. A handful of little white packages fell out, held together with sticky tape, closely followed by twenties, tens, and fives, all done up in drug-dealer-bundles. He reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a pair of blue nitrile gloves and snapped one on. Picked up one of the packets. ‘Angus, Angus, Angus. Is this what I think it is?’

‘It…I…’ He shifted in his seat, licked his lips. ‘Don’t suppose you’d take cash instead?’

Angus Black was chatty enough on the way back to FHQ, and while the nice Police Custody and Security Officer photographed, fingerprinted, and DNA-sampled him. And while they made themselves comfortable in interview room two with mugs of tea and stale digestive biscuits. But as soon as Logan switched on the audio and video recorders — silence.

Logan struggled on for half an hour, before giving up and terminating the interview. And as soon as the tapes were off, Angus started talking again. Typical.

He shrugged. ‘Exercising my human rights not to incriminate myself, aren’t I?’

‘So come on then,’ Logan led the way down to the cell block, Angus Black in the middle, PC Butler bringing up the rear — carrying the contents of Angus’s rucksack in half a dozen evidence bags — as they clomped down the stairs, ‘where did you get the gear? Wee Hamish?’

‘Off the record?’

‘Off the record.’

Angus made humming noises for a bit. ‘Same place I sorted out Danny’s loan…You meet that bint of his? Face like the back end of a wellington boot, how the daft sod managed to get that up the stick is anyone’s guess. Bag over her head and do her from behind?’

Butler gave him a shove. ‘Chauvinist pig.’

Angus staggered down the last couple of steps. ‘Hey, no pushing! Know what you buggers are like for people “falling down stairs”. Tell you-’

‘She’s a human being, not a sex object.’

‘Bloody right she isn’t. I wouldn’t poke her with-’

Logan stepped between them. ‘Enough, OK? These loan-sharks-slash-drug-dealers, where can I find them?’

Angus laughed. ‘No chance. You want that kinda info, it’s gonna cost. I’m not grassing those bastards up for free, they’ll sodding kill me. Don’t fancy ending my days as a big pile of dogshite.’

They handed him over to the PCSO who’d processed him in the first place, signed him into custody again, then headed back upstairs. Butler set off at a brisk pace, Logan struggling to keep up. He was huffing and puffing after a couple of flights, and by the time they reached the third floor, he was bent double, wheezing.

Butler patted him on the back. ‘You OK, Sarge?’

‘Just need a minute.’

Need to lose some weight. Get some exercise. Cut down on the fags. Lie down and die…

He coughed for a bit, every hack making his head pound. Finally he straightened up, held out his hands for the evidence bags, and told Butler to go see if they’d done a preliminary report on Steve Polmont’s post mortem yet.

As soon as she was gone, Logan pushed through the double doors into the hallowed ground of the Identification Bureau. Or the Scenes Examination Branch. Or whatever the hell it was the Scottish Police Services Authority were calling them these days. It was a long corridor with a scuffed green terrazzo floor; lots of corkboards covered in posters, memos, and holiday postcards; and a collection of wooden doors leading off into each sub-department.

Logan made straight for the little lab, knocked on the door, then stuck his head in.

The FHQ lab wasn’t much bigger than a large kitchen, lined with worktops, chunks of machinery, and a couple of upright fridges. The room was in partial darkness, a single anglepoise lamp shining down on a set of golf clubs. The metal shafts glinted as an IB tech swabbed the striking face of a nine iron with a cotton bud, headphones clamped over their ears. Bum twitching in time to the music.

Logan crept in and gave it a pinch.

‘WhatthefuckinghellRennie!’ Samantha span around, left hand flashing out. Logan danced backwards and the slap went wide.

‘Woah!’

She blushed. ‘Oh…Thought you were someone else.’ Her scarlet hair was stuffed into a baseball cap, the piercings in her ears, nose, and lip glinting in the light from the glowing tabletop. She had a smiley-face badge pinned to her My Chemical Romance T-shirt.

Logan stiffened. ‘Rennie comes in here and grabs your arse?’

Little bastard.

‘So, where you taking me for dinner?’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘What’s that horrible smell?’

‘I’ll bloody kill him.’

She patted Logan on the cheek with a latex glove, talking in a flat, deadpan voice, ‘Oh yeah, you’re so manly and butch. Uh-huh, it really turns me on. Etcetera.’ She dropped her hand. ‘Told him I’d kick his knackers up round his nipples if he does it again.’

‘Why’s he grabbing your arse at all?’

‘Don’t be so jealous.’ She turned back to the light box. ‘He does it then runs away giggling like a schoolgirl. Don’t think you’ve got anything to worry about.’

He was still a little bastard.

Tiny wrinkles appeared between her eyebrows, then she leaned in and sniffed again. ‘It’s you! Why do you smell of sick?’

Logan hefted the evidence bags onto the table. ‘Any chance…?’

Samantha groaned. ‘Might have known. And there was me thinking you’d come to carry me off to a nice romantic restaurant.’

‘I didn’t mean-’

‘What is it anyway?’ She pointed at the clear plastic evidence bag — the one full of Angus’s little white parcels. ‘Heroin?’

‘Hopefully.’

‘Ooooo, these are nice…’ She picked up one of the boxed hair straighteners. ‘Hundred quid in Boots. Make a good Valentine’s Day present for a loved one, don’t you think? You know, if you wanted to let them know you weren’t a tight-arsed skinflint with no prospect of ever getting his leg over again.’

‘Subtle.’

She poked at the other bags. ‘You want the iPods and perfume tested too?’

‘Might as well.’

She frowned at the bag with the money in it, snapped on a fresh pair of gloves, and pulled out one of the bundles. Unfolding the origami shape till it was a stack of battered-looking twenty-pound notes. ‘Jesus, these things are everywhere.’

Logan leant against the central unit. ‘You wouldn’t believe the kind of day I’ve-’

‘Got to admire the workmanship.’ She flicked on the light box and held a note against the glowing surface. The metallic strip showed up like a malignant shadow on an X-ray. ‘Clydesdale-Bank-issue Robert the Bruce twenty, circa 1994. Still in circulation.’ She opened a drawer, took out a jeweller’s glass and squinted through the magnifying lens at the note. ‘Real money, you’ve got about eighty, eighty-five different inks, all printed one after another. These are CMYK. Resolution’s amazing though…’

Logan picked one of the notes out of the bundle. ‘Looks OK to me.’

She straightened up. ‘Paper’s too white. They don’t make the original stock any more, and it wasn’t available for public sale anyway. Whoever’s making them’s faked up the watermark pretty well, but the trouble is making them look old enough. So they stick them in a cold tumble drier with a bunch of tea towels, or socks, or something, and squirt in some stewed tea every now and then. Softens them up and makes them all sepia. Good enough to fool the punters.’

She delved into the bag and took out another bundle. ‘They’re doing fives now too! How cool is that?’

Logan smiled, pulled up the bill of her baseball cap, and kissed her on the forehead. ‘If I’d known counterfeit cash got you this excited, I’d have brought some home ages ago.’

She pushed him away, smiling. ‘Cheeky. Give me a couple minutes to finish up.’ Samantha pointed at the nine iron. ‘DS Taylor got herself a murder. Wife paid a couple of blokes to teach her cheating husband a lesson with his own golf clubs. They kinda got carried away…’

‘Lucky old Doreen.’

‘You know, maybe we should skip the restaurant — grab a curry, go home, and climb into a nice hot bath. Get all soapy…’ She stepped in close, chest-to-chest, and kissed him, running her hands through his hair.

Logan flinched back — hot shards stabbing out across the back of his head. ‘Ow!’

‘Not still sore, is it?’ She grabbed him, turned him around, then Logan could feel her fingers working their way across his scalp. ‘What the hell did you do to yourself? Got another lump like a pickled egg back here. You collecting them?’

‘Like I said: it’s been a bad day.’ He forced a smile. ‘Now tell me again about getting all soapy.’