Chapter 79
The pool car pootled along a winding back road in the middle of nowhere, where gorse burned hot-yellow along the sagging drystane dykes and miserable sheep hobbled over sun-baked fields.
Definitely the sort of road that you suddenly met tractors coming the other way on.
Big ones. That wouldn’t even notice if they drove straight over a manky old Vauxhall, squashing it flat.
Which probably explained why Tufty wasn’t pelting it, with the blues-and-twos going.
Steel lounged in the back seat, making rancid-fish faces and long-suffering sighs. Still wearing that sodding hat. ‘I’m bored.’
Logan gave her a Paddingtoning in the rear-view mirror. ‘No one asked you to come.’
‘Yeah, but Beardy Beattie was being a pain in the patoot, and I’m too Zen to deal with his .
. . plop.’ Putting on a terrible Beattie impersonation for: ‘“Oh, they’re all so mean to me!”, “That Logan McRae’s got ideas above his station!
”, “Constable Quirrel is a useless, impertinent, syntax-mangling, dollop of shite!”’
Tufty joined the Rear-Mirror Frowning Club. ‘Hey!’ Eyes back on the twisting road. ‘Also: pound in the swear jar.’
‘Doesn’t count if it’s a direct quote.’
Actually, once you got past the heat-stroke sheep and parched fields it was really pretty out here, with plenty of trees and the bracken unfurling in the sunshine.
A teeny clot of seventies bungalows drifted by, complete with sagging sheds and an elderly woman in dungarees grimly chopping firewood for the winter.
Logan went back to his printed-out front page.
‘Pfff . . . Listen to this: “The sign on the door says, ‘Wendy’s Happy Wishes, Because Every Child Deserves Joy’ but twisted charity boss, Keith Braithwaite,” brackets, forty-one, “had wishes far darker than any child dying of leukaemia could ever imagine.” Talk about melodramatic, sensationalist, wanky writing.
“The unassuming businessman led a double life – raising money to grant the wishes of suffering children by day, and prowling Glasgow’s seedier streets for prostitutes and drug addicts to abuse by night . . .” Who wrote this?’
He had a wee squint at the byline: ‘LEROY MCGUIRE’.
Bet the Pulitzer committee kept his number on speed dial.
Tufty turned a corner and the trees faded back from the road, replaced by fields awash with clumps of hard green reeds. The buckled remains of a ring feeder lay off to the right, like the ribcage of some huge parasite that had died crawling out of the docken and brambles.
Back to the printout:
‘“Braithwaite forged a warrant card for himself, with the fictional name, ‘Detective Sergeant Alexander Nairn’, which he used to lure women into his battered Ford Focus, where he forced them to perform lewd sex acts in exchange for not ‘arresting’ them.”’
‘Saaaa-arge?’ Tufty scrunched up one side of his face. ‘If he was found not guilty, how come he didn’t sue them?’
Steel sniffed from the back. ‘Wee spud’s got a point. Some scummer talks poop about me, like that? I’m going home with every penny they’ve got. And their house. And having a big hairy mate of mine break both their frudging legs.’
True.
Off in the middle distance, the grubby fields were punctuated by a series of tumbledown cottages with missing roofs and vacant windows.
Mind you . . . ‘Maybe he did? We’ve only got the one article, could’ve taken them for millions.’
‘Here we is.’ Tufty turned left, off the tarmacked road, onto a rough track peppered with potholes.
A Mohican of grass ran down the middle and as the car rocked and rolled through the hollows its undercarriage scraped along the raised tufts.
Making horrible grinding noises whenever it hit a patch of gravel.
Steel sat forward. ‘What if your man decides he’s no’ wanting to cooperate? Violently.’
‘Really?’ Logan raised an eyebrow. ‘Not like you to be all timid. Frightened of messing-up our new hairdo, are we? Can stay in the car, if you like?’
‘You looking for a smack? I’m no’ “timid”, I’m nine weeks from retirement. That’s when people in action films get shot, or blown up. Thrown off a train or a building.’
The road hooked around to the left, dropping down a short, steep hill. Gorse rose on either side of the car, tinder-box yellow and ready to ignite in the blazing sun – getting taller as the track dipped, till it towered far above the car’s roof.
Tufty peered up at the jagged-green canyon walls. ‘She does got a point, Sarge. People with X-weeks left till retirement is always dropping like flies.’
At the bottom of the hill the land opened up, revealing a higgledy-piggledy graveyard of rusty old farm equipment. Going by the grass and weeds growing around and up through it, this stuff hadn’t moved in months. Maybe years.
Just past the mechanical cemetery, a five-bar metal gate blocked the track ahead.
The wee lad hopped out and scampered over to open it.
Steel poked Logan’s shoulder. ‘Aye, seriously though: should we no’ve landed mob-handed? This could go arse-shaped real quick; loads of these teuchter banjo-fuckers have gun licences, and I don’t fancy a shotgun enema.’
‘We’ll be fine. Besides, we don’t even know if this Braithwaite has anything to do with anything.’
‘Oh, aye, it’s just a huge coincidence his car was at Agapova’s house the night she disappeared, given her newspaper ruined his life and everything.’ Steel scowled as Tufty swung the gate open to clangggg against a fencepost. ‘Pretty good motive for revenge.’
. . .
Actually: she had a point.
Tufty hopped back in behind the wheel, drove them through the gateway. Stopped. Scrambled out again, and closed the gate behind them – like a weil-brought-up loon fae the sticks.
‘Yeah, you’re probably right.’ Logan turned in his seat. ‘Want to wait for backup?’
Her eyebrows scrunched. ‘Might as well take a wee look, while we’re here. Just in case? Bugger might no’ even be in.’
Now that they were Country-Code-compliant, Tufty returned – piloting the pool car past a twisted stand of trees and around another bend.
A small collection of farm buildings loomed ahead: two tumbledown old stone byres; a barn with concrete walls and a corrugated grey roof; and a static caravan in shades of diarrhoea-brown-and-disappointment-beige.
A forest of weeds surrounded the place, engulfing piles of building materials, while an ancient JCB backhoe sat off to one side.
Logan knocked on the dashboard. ‘OK, listen up: we’re on shaky ground here. No one takes any risks; no one wanders off on their own – line of sight at all times; no one gets shot, stabbed, beaten-up, their brains bashed in, or killed in any way shape or form. Understood?’
Steel shook her head. ‘Aye, remind me to give you a wee training session on motivational speaking, eh?’
Tufty parked the pool car next to a tired grey Vauxhall Astra, and they all climbed out into the stifling motionless air.
Muffled music thudded out of the caravan, heavy metal by the sound of it – the kind that was all screaming and howling and being very, very angry that Daddy didn’t buy you a pony.
A pile of pallets lay partially collapsed against one of the outbuildings, woven through with nettles and bramble. The spare bucket for an excavator rusted away, next to a big pile of gravel.
‘Aye, aye.’ Steel hauled up her trousers and pulled on her stolen shades. ‘Sounds like somebody’s home.’
Tufty grabbed the Airwave handset mounted on his high-vis, pressing the button and talking towards his nipple. ‘Alpha Charlie Eight to Control, we are in situ at Gorseburn Croft, near Durris. Be advised: looking for possible suspect in Natasha Agapova abduction.’
A tinny voice crackled out. ‘Roger that, Alpha Charlie Eight.’
He let go of the button and shrugged. ‘Just in case . . .’
Logan followed a trampled path through the grass and weeds between one of the outbuildings and the barn, into a sort of courtyard.
Then stopped, both arms out, blocking the way for Steel and Tufty.
‘What?’
‘Shhh . . .!’ He stuck a finger to his lips, then pointed at the trail of blood that spattered between the barn, the caravan, and the far building. Thick and dark. And a hell of a lot more than you’d get with a simple nosebleed.
OK.
Logan pointed at Tufty, then at the outbuilding. Then at Steel, and the caravan. Then at himself, and the barn. Then at both of his own eyes. Which surely everyone would understand?
Tufty nodded, and tiptoed along the side of the courtyard, making for his assigned target.
Good lad.
He peeked in through the ragged window hole. Then shot Logan a worried look, shaking his head and playing an invisible accordion. Whatever the hell that meant.
Steel picked her way across the quad, high-stepping over the trail of blood, to the caravan. Snapped on a pair of blue nitrile gloves and tried the door handle. Pulled a couple of times, before giving up and making a throat-cutting gesture with her thumb.
Locked.
Which left the barn.
The door was ajar, so Logan donned some gloves of his own and gave it a wee push . . .
Bloody hell.
Two figures lurked inside – one clothed, one half naked – along with a huge pool of blood.
‘Call it in: we need the whole circus here, ASAP!’
He stepped over the threshold, into the cool gloom, technically compromising the crime scene. But until he checked whether either of them were alive, that was just too bad.
The air stank of butchers’ shops and hot dust, full of fat greedy bluebottles that swirled and buzzzzzzzzzzzzed.
Looked as if the bloke, sitting on the floor with his back to the table saw, was dead. What with being pale as a block of lard, sitting in a lake of blood, with a gash right down his face, another across his chest, and a screwdriver poking out of his guts.
Pretty certain he was the man from the Scottish Daily Post’s front page: Keith Braithwaite.
Logan squatted down next to him, careful not to step in the scarlet lake, and felt for a pulse anyway. Because there were rules about this kind of thing.
Surprisingly enough: nope.
He stepped around the blood pool, making for the other figure.
Jesus . . .
Her torso was a map of bruises, her left knee all swollen and red, but her face was awash with dried blood, and a thick line of scabs framing her battered features. Even with the broken nose, black eye, and split lip, Natasha Agapova was easily recognisable.
And she was in her underwear. Never a good sign in situations like this. Especially given what Braithwaite had been charged with.
Logan knelt and felt for a pulse. ‘Please, please, please, please . . .’ Something trembled beneath his fingertips. ‘Ms Agapova? Natasha, can you hear me? It’s the police . . .’
Nothing.
Not even a flicker.
But she was alive.
Barely.
Logan turned, and there were Steel and Tufty – hovering just outside, staring in at the gory tableau. Trying not to mess-up the crime scene any more than he already had. ‘I NEED AN AMBULANCE NOW!’
And maybe, if they were lucky, she’d still be alive when it got here.
Today, the circus consisted of a grubby Scenes Transit van, four patrol cars, a handful of crime-scene marquees, and a black Mercedes.
No lions, tigers, or homemade elephants, but lots of hustle-bustle-rustle as techs hurried about in their white Tyvek suits. Taking samples and photographs and videos and fingerprints.
Steel settled back against the pool car, jerking her chin at the static caravan, where Chief Superintendent Pine was deep in conversation with one of the more senior Smurfs. ‘You should invite Perky Pine on Sunday. Bet she’d love to sample my lesbian sausages.’
‘Definitely not.’ Giving her the side eye. ‘And what exactly is in these “sausages” of yours, or don’t I want to know?’
The grin he got in return wasn’t exactly reassuring.
Urgh . . .
She patted him on the back. ‘We did good today: rescued the damsel in distress, saved the day.’
‘You did see the state of Keith Braithwaite, right? Our damsel turned him into a colander. She . . .’ He stood up straight as Pine peeled off from her conversation and strode across the courtyard towards them. ‘Here we go.’
Pine nodded. ‘Logan, Roberta. I think we . . .’ The rest of that sentence was drowned out as the Sky News chopper howled overhead.
Circling the buildings, filming the action on the ground.
‘Oh, in the name of God.’ Screwing her face into a knot.
‘Why do the TV news people get a helicopter, but we have to make do with begging Dundee for a drone operator? Who doesn’t even turn up, because he’s off on the sick!
’ She glowered at the aerial intrusion for a couple of breaths, then sighed.
‘Just heard from ARI – they’re trying to stabilise Natasha Agapova now.
Fingers crossed. Maybe.’ She kicked the head off a dandelion, sending a puff of teeny-umbrella seeds twirling away into the air. ‘What a mess . . .’
‘Erm . . . About that.’ Logan pointed at the second outbuilding, the one that didn’t contain a puddle of blood, broken whisky bottle, and galvanised bin full of concrete.
‘We think there might’ve been a second victim.
And given there’s a chunk of the field over there that’s recently been dug over . . .?’
‘Oh, that’s just great.’ Pine covered her face with both hands. ‘Any other disasters you’d like to coil out on my to-do list?’
‘SARGE?’ Sounded like Tufty, hollering away somewhere behind the barn. ‘HELOOOOOOO?’ Getting louder. ‘SARGE, SARGE, SARGE, SARGE, SARGE . . .’ He appeared around the corner. Gave Pine a wee wave. ‘Oh, hi, Boss.’ Then wiggled his phone at Logan. ‘Finally got a signal.’
The thrumming of rotor blades grew again, as Sky News made another pass.
Two white-suited Smurfs emerged from the barn, carrying a blue plastic evidence crate between them.
High in a tree, a pair of magpies screeched defiance, until the helicopter backed off.
And everyone stared at Tufty.
Finally, Logan gave him a poke. ‘And?’
‘Oh, yes, I see.’ The wee twit checked his phone.
‘You were bang-on the doodah – one Leroy McGuire, reported missing by his wife six weeks ago. Got an anonymous tip-off on a story, went to check it out, never came home. G Division looked into it, but . . .’ He shrugged, making his stabproof rise up and his neck shrink into the hole. Like a high-vis tortoise.
Logan turned to Pine. ‘McGuire was the journalist who broke the story about Keith Braithwaite, Boss. We figure Braithwaite maybe started his revenge tour with him.’
She dropped her hands and stared up into the wild blue yonder. ‘Given the way this week’s gone, if we dig up the field and do find a body, it’ll be someone else entirely.’
‘On the plus side: you said, “find Natasha Agapova in time for the lunchtime news,” right?’
Just a shame they didn’t know if she’d survive or not . . .