‘What about your boy Haddock?’ Martin asked.
‘What would you do with him?’
‘I think if it was possible to pat his head and kick his arse at the same time. .’
‘It was. Becky Stallings did the kicking and I did the patting. The kid has learned. In fact the kid learns something new every day, and that’s what makes him so damn good. I don’t want his self-belief damaged by this. In fact, I won’t let that happen.’ He dipped his fingers into a bag of chocolate M amp;Ms that Martin kept in his central console, and took as many as he could grab. ‘What about you?’ he said. ‘What did you think of all that?’
‘Do you really want to know? Seeing you and Grandpa McCullough in the same room was the most surreal experience of my police career.’
‘Eh?’ he laughed. ‘Why?’
‘Bob, remember what I said about Alex and young Cameron ruling the world? Well, I understand where that came from now. You and he, you could be fucking clones. You’re two peas, if not from the same pod, then pods grown on the same branch. You know what McCullough’s dad was? He was a lawyer, like yours, only he worked for the council rather than in private practice. What was it you said? Physical menace, ruthlessness and complete thoroughness. You could have been describing yourself, man. I watched the two of you in there and I thought, thank God one of them’s on our side of the fence, otherwise we’d all be fucked.’
‘Are you serious?’
‘Absolutely.’
Skinner picked up the bag of chocolate pills and emptied its remaining contents into his open hand. ‘In that case,’ he said, just before he swallowed them, ‘I’ll take it as a compliment.’
Eighty-nine
‘Jack,’ said Sauce, ‘it’s a nice thought, by both of you, but I’m OK.
Maybe we’ll go to Indigo on Friday, but I’m not in a boozing mood tonight. I’ll stay in, watch a couple of miserable French movies and cry my eyes out. Failing that, I’ll put on the Motown twenty-fifth anniversary CD and think of you. See you tomorrow.’
He hung up and walked across to his DVD collection. He almost settled on In Bruges but passed it by, because he found the finish heart-rending at the best of times. He looked at his CDs. Motown Twenty-fifth Anniversary was not a starter for the simple reason that he did not possess it, nor was Tom Waits’ The Black Rider because it was so weird that it was positively creepy, nor The Travelling Wilburys because Roy Orbison was dead. Finally he settled for the Foo Fighters’ Skin and Bones, turning the volume to just below neighbour intolerance level, and maybe even a shade beyond.
The sound was so loud that he almost failed to hear the buzzer. When it broke through, he turned the level down and stepped into the hall.
She was standing there when he opened the door, her carefully cut blond hair casually disarranged, her make-up simple but perfect and her lips that soft shade of red that he liked so much. ‘Hi,’ she whispered.
‘Miss McCullough, I presume,’ he replied, coldly.
‘Sauce, I’m sorry,’ she began. ‘I should have told you my real name, but with my grandpa being a wee bit notorious, and you being a cop. .’
‘I didn’t tell you I was a cop until after you’d told me your name. I’m a fucking detective; I can work that out. You also left out the bit about you being a fucking getaway driver.’
‘That was all a misunderstanding. That was my moron mother’s fault. They’ve dropped the charges against me.’
‘Yes, and what I told you, gullible idiot that I was. . God, a woman died.’
She flinched, and he thought he saw real pain in her eyes; for sure he saw tears. She put her arms around his neck and buried her face in his chest. ‘I didn’t know that would happen,’ she sobbed. ‘My mum asked me, for that bastard of a man of hers. But I never thought. .’
He heard a neighbour’s footsteps on the stair below, and drew her inside. She ran her fingers through his hair, and kissed him lightly. ‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered, ‘so sorry.’
‘Sorry doesn’t make it right.’ He looked into her smoky grey eyes. ‘You realise I’ll never be able to believe another fucking thing you tell me?’
She nodded.
He kept on looking. ‘Can I still call you Cheeky?’ he asked.
Ninety
In another part of the city, another door chime sounded. Andy Martin thought very seriously about ignoring it as he continued to gaze at the photograph on the sideboard. Karen had taken it: Robert, held in the crook of his arm, with Danielle looking at him with sisterly pride.
The chime summoned him again. ‘Bugger,’ he whispered, but trotted downstairs to street level, and swung the door open.
She stood there, in jeans and an open-necked white shirt, oblivious to the chill of the evening. She held a bottle in her hand, up beside her shoulder, with its label turned for him to see: Siglo Gran Reserva rioja, one he recognised from another time. Behind her he caught a glimpse of a taxi as it disappeared round the curve in the road.
‘To answer your slightly crazed question of the other night,’ she said, ‘there is no such thing as a hench. If it’s a word at all, it’s an adjective, but no one really knows.’ She smiled, and in spite of everything, his heart sang. ‘And now that I’ve answered the security question. .’ she continued, ‘. . can I come in?’