The Book of Souls (Inspector McLean #2)(96)
‘That’s Needy’s car, isn’t it?’
‘There’s more, sir,’ MacBride said. ‘I asked around if anyone had seen him yesterday. Nobody had spoken to him, but Gladys, the canteen lady, said she saw him first thing when she was getting the stock in for the day.’
‘Well we know he was here. His car’s here.’ McLean pointed at the screen.
MacBride pressed another button on the console and the image changed again. This time it showed someone standing by the same estate car that they had seen earlier. He zoomed in on the face, and although the resolution was bad, it was easy to see that something was badly wrong with it.
‘Aye, but we all thought he had the flu. Not a broken nose and black eyes that make him look like a panda.’
60
‘You really think Needy’s our man?’
DS Ritchie sat beside McLean as they drove south out of town towards the bypass. The sun low over the Pentland Hills made visibility a bitch, and the early rush-hour traffic didn’t help. It seemed like only a few hours ago he had been talking to Father Anton in the candlelit church that morning, and now evening was falling rapidly. McLean wished he could go faster, whilst at the same time knew more haste would ultimately mean less speed.
‘Fuck, I hate to have to admit Hilton could be right, but everything’s pointing to Needham at the moment.’ McLean ignored the angry toot of a horn as he cut up the inside of a dawdling school-run mother. One hand off the steering wheel, he began to count out the points. ‘He’s a loner, dominated by his father all his life. He’s been mouldering away down in the evidence store for years now, passed over for promotion God only knows how many times. He could have been a DCI by now if some toe-rag hooligan hadn’t put a broken bottle in his leg. He was on the Christmas Killer team longer than anyone else. And of course he had access to the keys to Anderson’s shop.’
Ritchie grabbed for the dashboard, supporting herself as the car tilted alarmingly round a roundabout. ‘Look out, sir!’
McLean slammed on the brakes as a taxi swerved across his path and to the side of the road, where it proceeded to unload an elderly gentleman. McLean wished he’d been able to get hold of a squad car, or even one of the unmarked CID pool cars. They all had sirens and hidden blue lights that could have cleared his route in no time. But as usual, all of them were out or broken, leaving a choice of the Alfa or Emma’s Peugeot. And they’d really needed to leave that for forensics to check over.
Dropping down into second gear, he roared past the taxi, twin-cam Italian engine bellowing a far better expletive than anything he could have come up with. The road ahead was clear for a bit and he concentrated on driving as fast as he safely could.
‘I hope Stuart’s managed to get in touch with traffic. It’ll be a right pain if you get pulled over.’
‘It’s all cameras along here,’ McLean said. ‘And frankly I don’t care right now if I set a few of them off. Damn!’
The traffic backed up to Kaimes Junction and once more he was forced to slow down.
Ritchie laughed. ‘You sound like Grumpy Bob, you know.’
McLean didn’t answer, and her smile soon faded. ‘We’ll find her. It’ll be all right,’ she added.
‘You knew her, back in Aberdeen?’ McLean wasn’t sure he wanted to talk about Emma, but anything was better than staring at the glaring brake lights of a thousand unmoving cars. ‘I’d be right in saying there was a bit of history?’
Ritchie shuffled in her seat. It could almost have been called squirming
‘We met on a few cases, yes.’
‘And that’s it? So why d’you go all stiff and formal every time she’s mentioned? More to the point, what’s she got against you?’
Ritchie said nothing for a while, just staring ahead as if she, too, were willing the traffic to evaporate. When she did finally speak it was in an oddly formal voice.
‘There might have been a bit of a misunderstanding. Over a certain detective constable.’
‘A male detective constable, I presume.’
‘As it turns out, he wasn’t worth either of our attention. Little creep’s a DI now, transferred down to the Met. And he shat on everyone to get there so quickly.’
‘So he’s long gone. Why’re you two still fighting over him?’
Ritchie didn’t answer, and McLean was left to ponder as the line of cars started to move. Traffic gnarled slowly along the short section of dual carriageway past Burdiehouse and under the bypass, finally freeing up as McLean took the turning to Loanhead. How long was it since he’d come this way with DS Robertson? Not more than a month. It felt like years.
The headquarters of Randolph Developments was a blaze of lights as they slipped past the compound. The old stone factory buildings were surrounded by machinery, but most of the portacabins had been moved away. McLean remembered the models that William Randolph had shown him, his plans for the regeneration of the city and its suburbs. No doubt work was about to begin on turning this place into yet another luxury living experience.
‘Give MacBride a call, will you?’ McLean said, an odd thought crossing his mind. Ritchie flipped open her phone.
‘What do you want to ask him?’
‘Did he ever get to speak to that professor at the university?’