Close to the Bone. Stuart MacBride

I? No, I was quite happy where I was, but you had to have someone to run around after your backside, doing all your bloody paperwork.’

      ‘There we go.’ She checked her watch. ‘Lasted a whole two weeks as acting DI before threatening to flounce off in a strop. That’s a record for you. Was starting to worry you’d grown up a bit.’

      ‘I’m serious.’

      ‘Oh, don’t be such a big girl’s blouse.’

      ‘I’ve had enough.’

      ‘Moan, moan, whinge, bitch, moan. Now I know where Rennie gets it from.’ She flipped open the little leather case and peered at the warrant card within, holding it out at arm’s length. ‘Jesus, there’s a face only a proctologist could love.’

      He grabbed his coat from the hook by the door. ‘Enjoy your paperwork.’

      ‘Park your arse.’ She pointed at the visitor’s chair on the other side of the desk. ‘Soon as Disaster McPherson’s finished screwing things up in Holyrood, you can go back to being a lowly defective sergeant. God, you’re such a drama queen.’

      ‘I am not a drama—’

      ‘You don’t see me whingeing on about running CID till Finnie returns from his wee jolly to Malaga, do you? Even though the sodding ACC’s down here every five minutes bitching about the budget and the rotas and the overtime bill? No: because I’m a team player, one of the lads, knuckling under and getting the job done like a pro.’ She had a dig at the underside of her left breast, scratching and tugging at the bra-line. ‘Course, the extra cash helps.’

      Logan stared at her. ‘You got a pay rise?’

      Scowl. ‘Don’t change the subject. You, Logan Bum-Face McRae, need to get your act sorted. Being a DI’s no’ about running all over the place, arresting people and getting punched in the nose: it’s about taking a strategic overview, staying in FHQ at the centre of your wee web of influence and organizing things, making the best use of the available manpower. And solving bloody cases!’

      ‘Like you ever—’

      ‘Now get your backside in gear and go see those poor missing kids’ parents!’

      Silence settled into the room, then a hiss and click as Steel’s electric cigarette gave another puff of steam.

      ‘What happened to, “being a DI’s no’ about running all over the place”?’

      ‘Parents need to see a senior officer, no’ some junior idiot in uniform wiping their nose on their sleeves. And if you’d done something about it in the first sodding place, you wouldn’t be in this mess.’ She chucked his warrant card back at him. ‘Now sod off before I decide to motivate you some more.’

      In the main CID office a lone detective constable was bent over the fax machine, cursing and swearing as she pounded away at the keypad. Other than her, the place was deserted: most of the dayshift would be down at their lockers already, getting changed to go home – or hiding so they wouldn’t have to answer the phones and get dragged into anything at five to five on a Sunday evening – while the backshift were off actually doing things, leaving the little corrals of chest-high partitions and scuffed beech desks to sulk unloved beneath stacks of forms and reports, empty sandwich wrappers and dirty mugs.

      Logan tried the small walled-off annex at the side of the room – the one with a brass plaque mounted on the door: ‘THE WEE HOOSE’. Someone had stuck a Post-it note to the thing, with ‘CONDEMNED FOR PUBLIC HEALTH REASONS!’ scrawled across it.

      Inside, DS Bob Marshall was frowning at a pile of receipts and an expenses form. His desk looked as if a stationery cupboard had thrown up on it. A big orange-and-black biohazard sign was mounted on the wall in front of him. As if anyone actually needed any warning…

      The other three desks were almost tidy, no sign of their owners, just the shelves laden with box files and manuals, the whiteboards covered with case lists for each DS complete with notes and dates.

      Bob scribbled something down on his form. ‘If you’re here to moan about them not catching Reuben yet: don’t. It’s sod all to do with me.’

      Logan slumped into his old familiar chair, the one with the wobbly castor and the creaky hydraulic thing, and the coffee stain on the seat that always made it look as if he’d had an unfortunate accident. Loved that chair. He ran a hand along the rough plastic armrest. ‘You’re a jammy sod, Bob.’

      ‘Mmm…’ He didn’t look up. ‘Think I can claim for that bottle of whisky I bought for the Levinston stakeout?’

      ‘Being a detective sergeant. OK, so you’ve got to put up with all the crap from the DCs and Uniform – and run around after the DIs like you’re their nanny – but it’s not bad, is it?’

      ‘Maybe I can kid on it’s for an informant?’

      Logan swivelled left and right, then back again. The bearings groaned underneath him. Just like the old days… ‘You’re not allowed to have unregistered informants: anything Chiz-related would have to go through the Secret Squirrel Squad. Put it down as a teambuilding expense under Finnie’s “Forward To Tomorrow” cost-code. By the time he gets back from Malaga no one will remember what it was meant to be used for anyway.’

      ‘Ta.’ Bob’s biro scribbled something down on the form.

      Logan creaked the seat around in a full circle, drawing his knees in at the last minute to avoid the leg of the desk. ‘See, that’s what I’m talking about: you’re out on stakeouts with a bottle of Glenfiddich, and I’m up to my ears in spreadsheets, cost centres, and budget plans. I remember when—’

      ‘Yeah, being dragged about, moaned at, and told to do stuff is just great. At least you get a shot at being DI, when’s my go?’ He grabbed another receipt from the pile and scowled at it. ‘You want anything in particular, or are you just slumming it for fun?’

      ‘Going out to the Garfield and Chung houses – fly the flag for community policing.’ Hydraulics go up, hydraulics go down, hydraulics go up.

      ‘The missing kids?’ Bob stood and picked a beige corduroy jacket off the back of his chair. ‘Suppose you want me to drive.’

      Logan stopped playing with the chair. Narrowed his eyes. ‘What did you have for lunch?’

      Bob pulled the jacket on. ‘Why?’

      ‘Bob…?’

      ‘Cauliflower and lentil curry from that wee place on Belmont Street.’

      Which explained the Post-it note on the door.

      ‘In that case, you can stay here and finish your expenses. No way I’m sharing a car with you.’

      ‘That’s discrimination.’

      ‘Self-bloody-preservation more like.’

      The Wee Hoose’s door opened and DS Chalmers marched in, carrying a stack of printouts, glasses perched on the tip of her nose. She smiled. ‘Keeping it warm for me?’ Pause. ‘The chair?’ Then dumped the paper on the desk behind him.

      Right: not his chair any more. Not his desk. He stood. ‘It’s your lucky day, Chalmers – instead of sitting here being gassed to death by Biohazard Bob, I’m rescuing you. Grab your jacket, we’ve got parents to visit.’

      Agnes Garfield’s mother glowered at them from the doorway. ‘Well, perhaps if you’d done something when we told you she was missing, she’d be home by now.’ Her long brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she fiddled with the ends, teasing them apart with yellow-tipped fingers. A smoker. But instead of stale cigarettes she stank of Ralgex and spearmint.

      Posters festooned Agnes Garfield’s bedroom walls: brooding vampires with greasy hair, monobrowed werewolves, Harry-Bloody-Potter… Then there were a few for books that looked as if they’d been lifted from the local