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Ross brushed away the inevitable chocolate crumbs that had landed on his shirt, wiped his mouth and spoke, his voice calm. ‘Right, let me get this straight. Your source, whoever the fuck it is, has mysteriously sourced intel that Hardie’s slimy lawyer is negotiating with the cops, and more specifically Chief Superintendent Miles Wakefield, and the CSMU to identify a misper, who is in fact a Polish murder victim topped on the orders of some bigwig?’
‘Aye, that’s about the size of it.’
‘It’s not that much, is it?’
‘Can you see a Hardie cooperating with cops?’
‘No, it’s absolute mince, pal. I’ve been in this job a long time, and no Hardie has ever helped the cops. He’s planning something.’ Ross rubbed his hair with his hand.
‘Any suggestions on how to handle it?’ asked Max.
‘This calls for my legendary tact in finding out shite like this. Trustme, I know everyone, and the reason I’ve survived as long as I have in the job is my tactful, sensitive diplomacy. I’ll make a call.’
‘Who to?’ said Janie.
‘Miles Wakefield. I’ve known the dickhead for decades, and he’ll level with me. I want to know why we’re not taking point on this, or at the very least being heavily consulted. We, after all, banged the bastards up.’ He picked up his phone from the desk and dialled, pulling himself to his feet with a half-strangled groan and moving towards the door with a slight limp, wincing a little as he did. ‘Miles, you old bugger, I’m hearing rumblings about Davie Hardie,’ he almost bellowed as he left the office.
‘The legendary tact,’ said Max, shaking his head.
‘How does he get away with being so rude to senior officers?’ said Janie.
‘I reckon he knows where all’t bodies are buried,’ said Barney, who produced his scratched and worn tobacco pouch and began to roll a cigarette, almost meditatively.
‘Anything on the supposed victim?’ said Janie, looking at Norma.
‘What makes you think I’ve been looking already?’ said Norma, peering from behind her screens, her glasses a little askew on her nose.
‘Because you always do. I bet you’ve half a profile compiled on the case already, just by listening in.’
‘Well okay, I’ve had a wee peek. Not much to it, really. She was living in a rented place in Glasgow. She went out one afternoon, her pal spoke to her on the way, and she thought it was to meet a man. There had been talk of an affair or something, but her pal didn’t know. She’d been a working girl, self-employed type using websites for a time, but had stopped a while before she disappeared. When her pal tried to call her, her phone went to answer machine and never came back on. Some evidence of hasty packing, and of an intention to travel, but she never showed up anywhere again. No sign of travel on border targeting, no banking activity, and no phone traffic afterthe day she disappeared. A big fat mystery. She was a bonnie wee thing,’ said Norma, shaking her head.
‘Any boyfriend?’
‘Not that I can tell, but the friend thought there was someone. One interesting thing.’
‘Go on?’ said Max, sipping his tea.
‘She was receiving money each month from a UK bank account that stopped as soon as she disappeared, the same with the rent payments that came from the same account. All stopped,’ said Norma, tapping at the keys, the familiar look of total concentration on her face.
‘Was anything done with that? It doesn’t seem right to me,’ said Max.
‘It looks fairly half-arsed as far as misper investigations go. It was quickly downgraded to medium risk, and then they took DNA samples from the flat, you know, hairbrush and toothbrush, and a profile was developed in case any body was found, but after that, nada. I think that they just thought she’d fled.’
‘That’s not a great example of a misper inquiry, is it? The money should have been followed up, at least. Can you have a look at the bank account, Norma?’
‘I can send the enquiry out. It could just be that she stopped the payments herself, once she knew she was going.’
‘It looks like she fled in a hurry, without her computer, and without mentioning it to friends, so how could she shut those accounts? It doesn’t seem right.’
The door to the office burst open, and Ross limped in, his scowling face red as a tomato. ‘That’s bullshit, Miles. Since when does a fucking villain like Hardie dictate who investigates, eh?’
He looked at Max and shook his head, angrily, the tinny voice on the other end of the line was almost audible, and it didn’t sound happy.
‘No, it’s shite, Miles. We put Hardie away, we should at least be able to be briefed on it.’
There was another pause, as Miles spoke.
‘DS Craigie had a tip-off, that’s all. We just want to have a poke around. What do you mean, not trusted? I’m not having that, Miles …’ Ross’s face flushed an even deeper shade of red, before he yelled down the phone, ‘Well, fuck you, too then.’ He threw the phone down on his desk.
