Truth Lies Bleeding

Chapter 19

Brennan felt the muscles in his shoulders tightening as he went back into the Chief Super’s office. He didn’t give her the satisfaction of seeing him lowered before her — he brushed aside the offer of the chair and stood, hands on waist. ‘What is it?’

Galloway rose to face him. She wasn’t going to give him a height advantage when she was wearing four-inch heels, he thought.

She picked up the News, dropped it again. ‘They’re having a fucking field day.’

Brennan shrugged. ‘Tell the press office.’

She pointed a maroon fingernail at him. ‘I’m telling you.’

He looked her in the eye. ‘What are you telling me, ma’am?’

That riled her, the ma’am bit, always did. Brennan knew he was in no position to be cocky. To be cocky, you needed something to back it up, or big-time supporters, and he had neither.

Galloway upped the volume a notch. ‘I’m telling you that if there’s another set of headlines like that, I’ll be wearing your balls as earrings. Do you get me?’

He smiled. ‘I think they might stretch your ears.’

She didn’t flicker, held her face stone. ‘I’m warning you, Rob… You’re on probation, don’t forget that. As easily as I handed you this case I can take it away.’

It was a bluff, he was sure of it; who else was there to take over? The squad was stretched too tight. Not even her golden boy Lauder could take on another case. He was sound. Brennan stared at her for a moment: she was no more police than Stevie McGuire, she was a shiny-arsed careerist. A manager; an actress like Wullie said. But she had rank, and the force was all about rank. He held himself in check, said, ‘Nobody wants this bastard more than me.’

She made a moue of her mouth. ‘I know that, but there’s a difference between wanting something and getting it.’ She’d made her point, asserted herself. As she sat down again she picked up the newspaper, folded it in two and dropped it in the waste-paper basket beside the desk. ‘No more headlines, Rob.’

Brennan nodded, turned for the door.

DC Stevie McGuire was waiting for him outside the Chief Super’s office. ‘Rob, can we talk?’

Brennan walked past him, heading for the incident room. ‘Oh, we’ll talk Stevie. Soon enough.’

Brennan walked fast, his stride powerful enough to lift the carpet at his heels. As he reached the room, the door was already open. One or two officers approached; he could tell they sensed the shift. Brennan flagged them down, said, ‘One minute.’ He made for the end of the room, stood looking at the board where the pictures of sixteen-year-old Carly Donald had been pasted up. There was a lot of white space.

As Brennan placed his jacket on the back of a chair a small crowd began to gather. He noticed DC Stevie McGuire lurking at the back and motioned him to the front.

‘Right, listen up.’ Brennan’s voice reverberated around the room. ‘We have a positive ID for our victim. I don’t need to tell you that we have our nuts over the fire, and the press are pouring on the petrol, so we need to get moving.’ He turned to McGuire, who had reached the front of the crowd. ‘Right, Stevie… Fill them in on our victim.’

There was silence in the room as the DC cleared his throat, and read from the file. ‘Carly Donald was sixteen, a schoolgirl from Pitlochry.’ Some audible surprise was registered.

‘Listen up,’ said Brennan. ‘Go on, Stevie.’

‘She’s the daughter of the Reverend John Donald, and his wife, Frieda, a housewife. They’ve formally identified the body.’

Brennan took over. ‘Right. That’s it so far. Not much to go on but we’ll be interviewing the parents in due course. Meantime, I want this girl’s world turned upside down and anything that falls out put on my desk. I want you out there knocking doors, now. Friends, teachers, hockey team-mates, youth club members, the man she bought her Smarties from — I want them all spoken to. Got that?’

The group answered together, ‘Yes, sir.’

Brennan held the crowd rapt as he moved on to disseminate specific instructions. ‘Brian, I want you to grab all the CCTV. I want footage from the train stations, the bus station, taxi ranks, BP garages, truck stops… Anywhere you might think she’d show if she was coming here from the north.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Lou, get on the homeless shelters in the city. She had to be staying somewhere. Check out all the halfway houses, the cheap hostels in Hillside and elsewhere. This was a young girl away from home… Think where she’d go, think where she’d end up.’

‘Sir.’

Brennan looked round the room again. His eyes lighted on another face. ‘Davie, find out how she supported herself. Was she brass? If she was working the streets, who was pimping her? Call the faces in — all of them.’

‘Yes, boss.’

The room remained quiet, still, as Brennan leaned forward, rested his elbows on the back of his chair. ‘I don’t need to remind you that this is a young girl from a respectable family. She’s been cut up in the most brutal fashion imaginable. The media are already interested. When they get the full details they are going to go ape-shit. I want you all to work fast, but stay alert. Don’t let anything slide, don’t think twice about throwing up anything to Stevie or me — we’ll look at everything. Now, one more thing: I’m cancelling all leave with immediate effect.’ He paused, expecting to hear groans. None came. ‘Good, I’m glad you understand. We need to move like lightning. Our killer has already tried to cover their tracks and I want this bastard behind bars. Right, get to work.’

The group scattered. Brennan yanked his jacket from the chair, headed for the office. As he went, he called out, ‘Stevie, in here now.’

DC McGuire followed him in.

‘Shut the door.’ The young officer pressed a hand on the glass panel; there was a gentle click as the door closed.

McGuire was speaking before he turned round: ‘I didn’t go to her. I went to you, but your phone rung out… What was I supposed to do?’

‘How about fucking try again?’

McGuire’s mouth opened, closed quickly, then words seemed to come through clenched lips: ‘I did. I did. Look, she was here, in the office and asking questions all night. I could hardly…’

Brennan got the picture. He conceded that McGuire hadn’t gone out of his way to shaft him. At least, he gave him the benefit of the doubt on this occasion. Too much had happened in the last twenty-four hours to think about settling scores right now. The case had to be first priority.

‘Did you haul in Trish Brown last night?’ said Brennan.

‘Yes, I did. Look, boss, I saw the initial pathology report too and I thought about the indicators but I just don’t think-’

Brennan interrupted, ‘Good, I don’t fucking want you to think. Did you get her swabbed and dabbed?’

McGuire nodded. ‘Yes. Should have results around late morning.’

‘Where’s she now — Trish?’

‘Downstairs. We’re holding her and the other girls. Sir, I have to say, they knew fuck all.’

Brennan shook his head from left to right. ‘Not a hint?’

‘They were silly wee girls, just talk, y’know. Lou and me, we went through them till the wee hours. Got nothing. I think we’re barking up the wrong tree.’

He was probably right, thought Brennan. If the victim wasn’t local, the chances of her knowing the girls that found her remains looked slim now. He said, ‘Wait for the lab boys. If you get the all-clear, let them go. But if there’s any dubiety, I want to know.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And you warn them to keep their traps shut in front of the fucking press!’

McGuire nodded. ‘Of course, sir.’

Brennan told the DC to type up the interviews and have them on his desk by close of play, then, ‘Tell me about Carly’s parents, Stevie.’

He moved forward, pulled out a chair. ‘Queer fish if you ask me.’

‘How come?’

‘Well, they’re your typical sheep-shaggers for a start — northerners, y’know. Full of religion.’

‘He’s a minister — I’d be surprised if they weren’t.’

McGuire sat on the edge of the chair. ‘Nah, it’s more than that. There was a couple of times I thought he hushed her up, like she was going to say something he didn’t want to get out. They were very guarded, cautious.’

Brennan leaned forward. He scratched his brow. ‘You think they’re not letting on about something?’

‘I don’t know… It was just a feeling I got.’

Brennan had learned to trust those feelings. ‘Then we should get them on the rack.’

McGuire seemed doubtful: ‘They were a nice couple.’

‘I don’t give a flying fuck, boy. Their daughter’s been killed — you know most victims know their murderers, don’t you?’

McGuire looked at his hands, turned over his palms. ‘Yes, boss.’