couldn’t believe that. ‘Forty-three?’
‘Oh, shut up.’ She spent a couple of minutes smoking and scowling. ‘Any fuckwit under the sun can get his girlfriend knocked up and bang: he’s a dad. Doesn’t matter if he’s a junkie, a wino, or a pervert, as long as he’s got a working dick he gets to make babies. No one from the Social interviews him, do they? How fair is that?’ She smacked her hand on the dashboard, sending an avalanche of ash all over the black plastic. ‘Aw shite…’ She swept the worst of it up and turfed it out of the window, leaving a grey smear behind. ‘No fags, no drink, and no swearing. That sound like me to you?’
‘Maybe it won’t be as bad as—’
‘You know what? Sod it. If I’ve got to be someone else for the rest of my life, I’m bloody well giving the old me a good send off.’ Steel flicked the last of her cigarette out into the beautiful afternoon, where it ricocheted off the side of an electrician’s van. ‘Call the gang, Laz: seven o’clock tonight we’re getting blootered and hitting a titty bar.’
Classy.
But never let it be said that Logan wasn’t a team player.
The Monday morning briefing had a carnival atmosphere to it, everyone lounging in their chairs, talking about where they were going on holiday. DC Rennie – tanned and smug – handed out a mound of bacon butties, the tinfoil packages releasing their savoury-scented steam into the crowded room. Logan’s stomach growled, then lurched as Rennie stuck one under his nose, saying, ‘Don’t say I’m never good to you.’
‘Urgh … get that bloody thing away from me!’
The constable sank into the next seat. ‘God, you’re not still on that vegetarian nonsense are you? Been seven months: get over it.’
‘You know what you can do with your bacon buttie? You can shove it right up your—’
The door opened and everyone sat up, shut up, and prepared to pay attention. Only it wasn’t DCI Finnie standing in the doorway – hauling his bra up with one hand, and carrying a plastic bag from Tesco in the other – it was DI Steel. She paused and stared at them all. ‘Don’t tell me he’s still no’ here!’
She finished rearranging herself, then took the seat on the other side of Rennie. The constable smiled and offered her Logan’s rejected buttie. ‘Got an extra one for you.’
She took it without a word, ripped a huge bite out of it, then sat chewing in scowly silence.
Rennie sniffed. ‘You’re welcome.’
‘Oh don’t be such a whinge.’ The inspector’s words were muffled by a cheek-straining mouthful. ‘Is this going to take long? Only I’ve got a date with a rapist called Norman.’
‘You know, when I was in Thailand—’
Steel made a little naked sock puppet out of her left hand and went, ‘Blah, blah, blah. Look at me, I’m Defective Constable Rennie, and I went to the Far East with Gary Glitter Tours.’
The constable blushed. ‘That’s not funny.’
‘Aye it is. Isn’t it Laz?’
Logan shook his head. ‘Didn’t you hear? Rennie’s got himself a grown-up lady friend. About twenty years older than he is.’
‘Is it his mum?’
Rennie scowled. ‘That’s the last time I get a round of bacon butties in. Ungrateful bastards.’
‘Does she make you a packed lunch in the morning and tell you not to talk to strange men?’
‘Just—’
‘Read you a bedtime story?’
‘We—’
‘Bet she gives your arse a good spanking when you’ve been naughty.’
And at that, Rennie’s blush got even redder.
‘She does!’ Steel laughed, spraying out a claggy mush of half-chewed bread and bacon. ‘Oh, you are such a pervert!’ Five minutes later she was obviously getting bored of winding the constable up, because she shouted across the room: ‘Hoy, Pirie – where’s your lord and master?’
DCI Finnie’s sidekick looked at his watch. ‘Supposed to be here.’
‘I know where he’s supposed to be, what I want to know is where he actually is!’
‘Em…’
‘Oh for God’s sake.’ Steel marched down to the front of the room. ‘Right, we’re none of us getting any younger, so: briefing. Everyone who’s on an active case, stand up.’
Tumbleweed.
‘Aunty Roberta says, on your feet, you lazy bastards!’
Reluctantly, they did as they were told, the sound of rubber-soled chair legs squeaking on the green terrazzo floor.
‘Better.’ Steel crossed her arms. ‘Right, if you can see someone else on your case who outranks you, sit your arse down.’
That left half a dozen Detective Constables and Detective Sergeants. The inspector made them all give a little report on their investigations: background, current status, and estimated chances of not cocking the whole thing up. The last one standing was DS Pirie.
He ran a hand through his wiry ginger hair, straightened his suit jacket on his skeletal frame, and brought everyone up to date on Operation Oedipus. The slideshow was set up ready for the absent DCI Finnie, and Pirie started at the beginning. The very first victim’s tattered face filled the screen. ‘Tolek Dobrowski, twenty-three, electrician, originally from Gdańsk.’
Steel scrunched up the tinfoil her bacon buttie came in and lobbed it at the detective sergeant. ‘Don’t sod about, we’ve been over this already. Tell us something we don’t know.’
Pirie flushed, filling in the space between his freckles. ‘Fine…’ He went scrabbling through his notes. ‘The … here we are: the only thing our victims had in common, is that they’re all Polish nationals, except for Simon McLeod. And none of them will tell us anything about what happened, or why.’ He turned and poked the projection screen. ‘Someone does that to you, and you don’t talk to the police?’
Steel snorted. ‘They’re scared, you idiot. What do you think our eye-gouger would do to them if he found out they talked: bake them a cake? Move on!’
‘Ah, yes, well…’
Rennie stuck up his hand. ‘Why are we calling him Oedipus?’
Pirie squared his shoulders, scowling at the interruption. ‘If you’d been paying attention Constable, you’d know why. Now—’
‘Yeah,
