LITMIR.BIZ

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trowels, beards and silly hats. You know the drill.’

      ‘Warrants? Budget?’

      Steel pulled her mouth into a thin line. ‘You do your bit, I’ll sweet talk Finnie. Worst comes to worst I’ll go rummaging through his trouser pockets.’

      ‘Yeah,’ Logan nodded. ‘That’s the kind of threat that’ll make him cooperate.’

      ‘Still say this is a bad idea…’

      ‘Just shut up and keep an eye out.’ DI Steel squatted in front of the dark-blue door and peered in through the letterbox. It was a nondescript tenement building in Northfield, three stories of damp grey granite with six flats arranged either side of a central stairwell.

      Logan leant on the balustrade, the plastic bags on his hands crinkling as he peered down from the top floor. ‘We need to get back to the station before the samples deteriorate. And you know what else we need?’

      Steel stuck her hand through the letterbox, then her wrist, then as much of her arm as she could, tongue sticking out the side of her mouth. ‘You to shut up?’

      ‘A warrant. We need a warrant.’

      They’d got the address on the way back into town, Steel telling Control to do a reverse lookup on the telephone number they’d got from Steve Polmont’s mobile.

      ‘Come on you wee bugger…’ She had her face flat against the door now, teeth clenched, one eye squinted shut. ‘Shitebags.’ She slumped. ‘Can’t reach.’

      Logan nodded. ‘Good, now we can go get a warrant, and come back and do it properly.’

      Steel wriggled her arm free. ‘Don’t need a bloody warrant. Polmont could be in there, dying right now.’

      ‘But—’

      She stuck a finger to her lips and shushed him. ‘Did you hear that? Someone crying for help?’

      ‘God, you are such a cliché.’

      Steel stood, took two steps back, then slammed her high-heeled boot into the door, by the lock. She hopped away, swearing and clutching her ankle. The door hadn’t even moved. She crumpled against the wall, wobbling on one leg. ‘Well, don’t just bloody stand there!’

      Sigh. Logan squared up to the lock, raised his damp, mud-spattered foot, and kicked. The door juddered. On the second go it flew open in a burst of splintered wood. ‘Happy now?’

      Steel limped forward as the front door to the next flat burst open. A man in a tatty blue dressing gown lurched out onto the landing, brandishing a massive monkey wrench. Hair flat on one side, sticking up on the other.

      ‘Right, you little bastards…’ He staggered to a halt. Stared at Logan and Steel. Then at the kicked-in door. Backed up a step.

      The inspector jerked a thumb at Polmont’s flat. ‘When did you last see the guy who lives here?’

      He let the arm clutching the wrench fall to his side. ‘I work nights.’ He shuffled backwards until he was inside his own flat. ‘Try to keep the noise down, yeah?’ And closed the door.

      ‘So much for Neighbourhood Watch.’ She hobbled past Logan into Steve Polmont’s home.

      It looked like the kind of place that got rented out fully furnished, which meant a random collection of shabby furniture and mismatched crockery scrounged up from second-hand shops. No paintings or pictures on the walls. Carpets that hadn’t seen a hoover since the turn of the century. Just about bearable if you were going to be working on a building site for the next year and a bit.

      The lounge and kitchen were two halves of the same room, filled with a sharp, rancid smell. Two clothes horses sat in the middle of the carpet, covered in socks and pants, a pair of jeans, and a threadbare checked shirt.

      Empty whisky bottles stood guard along the kitchen work surfaces, a regiment of empty Grant’s vodka bottles on the greasy windowsill.

      A dirty bowl sat on the little kitchen table with the pale pink husks of shrivelled Rice Crispies clinging to the edge, a half-full bottle of Bell’s sitting next to it.

      The breakfast of champions.

      Logan fumbled the fridge door open with his plastic-bagged hands. A couple of microwave ready meals, a carton of milk past its sell-by date, a block of cheddar going green and hairy. ‘Polmont’s not here.’

      ‘Shut up and help me look for clues.’ She limped back down the corridor. The first door opened on a small bathroom thick with the bitter tang of old sick. Next was a bedroom, with an unmade double bed, an overflowing ashtray, a tub of hand cream, and a copy of Butt-Mania magazine – a couple of used tissues lying by the side of the bed.

      A little boxroom lay behind door number three. And it was actually full of boxes: iPods, hair straighteners, cartons of cigarettes, portable DVD players, drums of electrical cable, strange rectangular things with wires sticking out of them, a couple of fuse boxes…

      Steel gave a low, breathy whistle. ‘Must be, what: three, four grands’ worth in here?’

      Logan nudged a large brown cardboard box with his foot. It clinked. ‘What about this lot?’

      ‘I don’t know, do I? Open it.’

      He held up his bagged hands. ‘How? You wouldn’t let me go back to the station.’

      ‘God’s sake, got to do everything myself…’ She ripped the top flap back and hauled out a bottle of Grant’s vodka, just like the ones in the kitchen, only full. Another three boxes were stacked underneath the window. Steel checked – more vodka. ‘What do you think, nicked?’

      Logan nodded at a dozen multipacks of Durex condoms. ‘That or he was planning one hell of a weekend.’

      Steel peered into another box. ‘Journals.’ She dumped one on top of a crate of rolling tobacco and flipped it open. The pages were creased and grubby, covered in a dense web of dark-blue biro. She peered at it, then backed off, and tried again, one eye squinted shut. ‘Bloody handwriting’s appalling.’

      Logan looked over her shoulder. ‘Get your eyes tested.’

      ‘I don’t need glasses.’

      ‘If you say so.’

      To be fair, Steve Polmont’s writing was appalling. The letters all ran together with lots of crossings out and scribbled annotations. ‘Listen to this: “G and Y went on the rampage today – found out someone’s been helping themselves to the shipments. Saw A give J a kicking for it. Have to lay off for a while.” It’s dated Sunday.’

      ‘What else?’

      ‘Something about a telephone conversation…’ The writing grew increasingly erratic, until it was little more than a collection of random scribbles. ‘Must’ve been drinking while he wrote it.’

      Steel slapped Logan on the arm. ‘Told you I didn’t need glasses. Who’s “G and Y”?’

      ‘No idea. “A” might be Andy? The big bald bloke?’ Logan tried, and failed, to turn the page with his bagged hands. ‘Little help?’

      ‘What did your last slave die of?’ She was rummaging through another box, pulling out bundles of computer games, still wrapped in shiny plastic. ‘Fancy the new Resident Evil?’

      ‘That would be unethical.’

      ‘You’re quite right, Sergeant, what was I thinking?’ She stood and slipped a copy into his jacket pocket, then stuck a couple more in her handbag. ‘Let’s face it, if Polmont’s nicked them off Malk the Knife, Malky’s no’ exactly going to come round the station asking for his gear back, is he? This stuff’ll sit in evidence for six months then get turfed into the police auction. Or chucked through an industrial wood chipper. It’s win-win.’ She snapped her bag shut. ‘Right, back to the station. We’ll

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