There was a shock.
‘What about property? Does he own something in Cruden Bay?’
‘No mention on the Police National Computer.’
Sod.
‘Well... can we get the Land Registry to rush through a search?’
‘Maybe. Or...’ More keyboarding, this time accompanied by a hummed version of the Countdown clock theme tune. ‘Woot! We’re in luck! But only because I has a genius.’
Whatever came next was drowned out as the helicopter’s engines roared. It pulled forward, gathering speed, then heaved itself into the air on a rib-shaking clatter of blades — the whump-whump-whump fading as it climbed and turned, heading out over Dyce towards the sea.
‘Sarge? Hello? I said, “Aren’t you going to ask what flavour of genius I has?”’
‘Is it my-boot-up-your-bum flavour?’
A sigh. ‘You get more like her every day, you know that, don’t you? No, it’s searching-for-incident-reports-involving-Jeffrey-Moncrief flavour. And amongst the hundreds of entries, there’s sixteen call-outs to the same address in Cruden Bay. And yes, you may compliment the chef.’
‘You, my little fiend, have earned your bum a reprieve and a bag of Skittles too.’
‘Woot!’
‘KING!’ Logan ran for the Audi. ‘GET YOUR BACKSIDE IN THE CAR — WE’VE GOT SOMETHING!’
37
Fields and fences flashed by the Audi’s windows as Logan roared along the back road towards Balmedie. Lights flickering, siren wailing. He yanked the car out onto the wrong side of the road, changed down a gear, and stuck his foot hard to the floor, overtaking a little grey Skoda with what looked like nuns inside it.
Sitting in the passenger seat, King grabbed the handle above his door, phone in his other hand — pinned to his ear. Belting it out: ‘What?... Heather?... No, I can’t hear you!’
Logan slowed for a sharp bend, throwing King against the door with the change of direction, then hit the accelerator again.
Flames of broom and whin crackled along the drystane dykes. A flickering strobe of fluorescent yellow and dark green.
‘What?’ He stuck the phone against his chest and grimaced at Logan. ‘Can we switch the siren off? Can’t hear myself think!’
‘You want to end up dead? Because if you do I can switch the lights off as well.’ They flew past a couple of tiny cottages.
‘Told you we should’ve taken the bypass!’
‘Eastbound’s closed for a three-vehicle RTC, remember?’ He slammed on the brakes at the T-junction, slithering to a halt on the double dotted lines. Then nipped out ahead of a muck-encrusted Transit, shifting through the gears like a rally driver. Slammed on the brakes again for a hard left, almost bouncing King out of his seat.
‘Gah!’ King braced his legs in the footwell. ‘Speak up H... No... I know I said that, but I need every hand we’ve got out to Cruden Bay.’ He glanced across the car. ‘ETA...?’
‘Twenty, twenty-five minutes.’
A nice long straight bit — the needle hitting ninety-six as Logan floored it. Swathes of barley whipping past. Nipping out to overtake a tractor.
‘Call it twenty-five minutes, H. But sooner you lot get there the better.’
A farmyard lunged up on the left — a huge eighteen-wheeler was in the process of pulling on to the road, the driver’s eyes going wide as he spotted them, his lorry juddering to a halt, air brakes squealing.
Logan jerked the Audi around it.
‘Car. Car! CAR!’ King scrunched his eyes shut and had a wee scream to himself.
He jinked the Audi back onto their own side of the road, about six foot away from ploughing straight through the Range Rover coming the other way.
A deep, shuddering sigh from the passenger seat. ‘OK, leave the siren on.’
‘We need to do a risk assessment. And see if DS Gallacher can get us a canine unit, OSU, firearms team: the works.’
‘There isn’t time for that!’ A frown. ‘Do you think there’s time for that?’
‘No, but we need to ask for all that stuff so at least we can say we tried if everything goes horribly wrong.’
‘Sodding hell...’ King switched his phone to the other ear. ‘Heather? I need you to see about backup: Dogs, Thugs, Guns, and anything else you can think of... Uh-huh... Uh-huh... Hold on.’ He stuck it against his chest again. ‘How sure are we?’
Cows stopped doing cow things to stare at the car as it howled past.
‘Eighty percent. Maybe seventy.’
Yeah, King didn’t look convinced by that.
Have another go: ‘OK, fifty / fifty?’
Another conflagration of gorse, the flowers a searing shade of molten gold.
King nodded, then stuck the phone to his ear again. ‘Call it forty / sixty, H. But it’s the best lead we’ve got... Yes, I know it’s the only lead we’ve got. Heather, get it done, OK?... Thanks.’ He hung up and bared his teeth in a pained wince as they wheeched through an avenue of trees. ‘It’s more like thirty / seventy, isn’t it?’
‘Better than nothing.’
A short row of bungalows on the left as they flew into Belhelvie — Logan standing on the brakes to take them down to a more sedate forty. In case someone’s cat had a death wish. Or child. Or grandparent.
Another T-junction, this one marked with a set of signposts. Left: ‘POTTERTON’, right: ‘BALMEDIE B977 1½’, a huge green and white CLAAS tractor rumbled across in front of them, hauling a trailer behind it. Soon as it’d passed, Logan nipped out, overtook it, then put his foot down again. ‘Maybe twenty / eighty.’
The A90 should’ve been quicker: after all, it was nowhere near as twisty-turny as the wee side roads, but there were a hell of a lot more vehicles on it. Some of which were clearly being driven by morons WHO WOULDN’T GET OUT OF THE BLOODY WAY!
Like the one right in front of them. And it wasn’t as if Logan could overtake them, not with all the traffic coming the other way.
He stuck his hand on the horn and held it there — blaring away in addition to the siren — until the moron in question finally took the hint and pulled their manky BMW over to the side of the road.
King took a deep breath as Logan hammered the speed up again. ‘OK, so what’s the plan?’
‘We get there, we wait for backup.’
‘And what if Professor Wilson, or Matt Lansdale, or Scotty Meyrick dies while we’re sitting on our thumbs?’
Good question.
Logan overtook a removal van. ‘Yes, but what if we barge in there, getting them and ourselves killed?’
‘Suppose.’ King looked over his shoulder, at the back seat. ‘What kit have you got in the car?’
‘What do you mean, “kit”?’
‘Taser, stabproof vests, extendable baton, pepper spray?’
‘It’s my car, not the Batmobile!’ Using the opposite lane to leapfrog a Citroën, a Kia, a Vauxhall, and a Transit with ‘EAT MAIR FISH!’ on the side.
‘You’ve got blues-and-twos.’
‘A couple of LED lights and a siren don’t make this an assault vehicle. And they only fitted them because it was cheaper than buying another pool car for Professional Standards.’ He roared past a filthy Toyota Hilux. ‘I’ve got a couple of high-viz vests, if that helps?’
‘What are we going to do, Health-and-Safety Mhari and Haiden to death?’ He scrunched his face up. ‘Come on, Frank: think.’ A pause as they slowed for another bout of traffic coming the other way. ‘OK. OK. No equipment. What about... a crowbar: something we could lever a door open or hit people with?’