Blind Eye (61 page)

'I told you: it'll blow over. You just gotta give it time.'

'No. I mean him and Wee Hamish Mowat.'

Pirie's left eyebrow shot up so fast it looked as if it was about to break free of his head. 'Oh aye?'

'I saw Finnie take a brown envelope from one of Wee Hamish's boys.'

'Ah...' Pirie ran a hand through his wire-wool hair, watching as a scooter overtook them. 'I can get out and push if you like?'

'I'm serious.'

'Finnie gets brown envelopes from Wee Hamish all the time.'

'What?' Logan stared at him. 'You
knew
about it?'

Shrug. 'Course I did. Power behind the throne, remember?'

'But... Why...?'

'Why didn't I report it? Because they don't have money in them, they've got information. Look at it from Wee Hamish's point of view: someone tries muscling in on his turf, what's he going to do? Yeah, he can fight back, or whatever, but that costs him time, money, manpower, and there's always the risk something will get connected to him. Never been arrested in his life, think he wants to start now?'

Logan slumped, said, 'Fuck,' then banged his head off the steering wheel.

Pirie's voice jumped up an octave. 'Think you'd like to keep your eyes on the road?
Please
?'

'He's using us.'

'Where did you learn to bloody drive?'

'He doesn't need bent coppers, he gets us to do his dirty work for free.'

'It's a two-way thing, OK? Wee Hamish sends Finnie a wee brown envelope with all the details. We make the arrest - bad guys are off the streets, and no one gets fed to the pigs. It's win, win...' Pirie frowned. 'Wait a minute, it was you, wasn't it? You set Professional Standards on him: told them about the brown envelopes.'

'I thought he was on the take.'

'Do you have any idea how much pain and extra work you caused him? They crawled all over every inch of his record, picked him apart for two whole days. Made his life a living
hell
.'

Logan sighed. 'I'm sorry, OK?'

Pirie threw his head back and laughed. 'Sorry my arse - it's been great. I owe you a drink!'

66

Peterseat Drive was a loop of dirty tarmac on the northernmost edge of Altens. Most of the buildings were new or not even finished yet: warehouses and storage depots. Stacks of offshore containers were locked away behind chain-link fences. Piles of drilling pipe. Huge chunks of metal, painted bright primary colours.

Logan pulled the rattling Fiat up to the kerb and killed the engine, before it died of its own accord.

'Right.' Pirie unfastened his seatbelt and popped the passenger door open. 'Got to have a quick word with my Chiz: find out what he knows.'

Logan clambered out of the car, but Pirie held up a hand. 'You know the rules - total anonymity for all Covert Human Intelligence Sources; my guy sees you, he'll run a mile. Hell, I shouldn't even be
talking
to this guy without Bain's say so.'

'But--'

'I'll only be two minutes, OK? Just chill till then.' Pirie turned, stuck his hands in his pockets and ambled across the road to a yard full of anchor chains.

Logan slumped against the roof of the car and smoked a cigarette. He was grinding it out on the rusty paintwork when his mobile started ringing. He dug the phone out and grimaced: according the display it was DI Steel. Probably wanting to know where the hell he was. He let it ring through to voice-mail. She was back on thirty seconds later. Logan ignored it.

Down the street, Pirie stuck his head out of a gate and beckoned.

Logan hurried across the road. 'Well?'

'Sort of.' Pirie turned and pointed at one of the brand-new warehouses. It wasn't quite finished yet, the construction sign still up by the wire gates read: 'C
OMING
S
OON
- R
IG
S
PAN
T
ECH
D
OWNHOLE
S
ERVICES
'. Dark blue roof and beige walls, attached to a small office block that hadn't progressed beyond the raw breeze block and hollow window frames stage. No sign of life. 'According to my guy, there was a firm called Kostchey International Holdings Limited doing site security there till about a week ago. You wanna check it out, see if we can get a billing address?'

Logan did.

They abandoned the Fiat where it was and walked down the half-finished pavement in the blazing sunshine. This part of the road was quiet, just the occasional clang of metal on metal, or beep-beep-beep of a reversing forklift truck. A radio somewhere inside one of the yards, playing Northsound 2.

Pirie kicked an empty plastic bottle, sending it spinning down the dusty pavement. 'So ... did you really get blown up?'

'That why you're helping me get back into Finnie's good books? Pity?' The further down the road they walked the newer the buildings got, until they were just partially constructed shells.

'Nope.' They'd caught up with the plastic bottle, and Pirie gave it another kick.

Logan's phone started ringing. Again.

'You going to answer that?'

'It'll be Steel, telling me I'm supposed to be in with Professional Standards.'

The ringing stopped, there was silence, and then it started again.

'It's kinda irritating.'

Logan pulled the thing out and switched it off. 'Happy now?'

One more kick and the bottle clattered against the fence surrounding RigSpanTech's almost-finished warehouse. A length of chain was looped through both sides of the gate, but the padlock wasn't shut.

Logan followed Pirie into the building site. They hadn't even started laying the road yet - everything was hard-packed dirt and rubble.

Pirie shaded his eyes against the sun, staring at the half-built office unit and the warehouse beyond. 'Look, over there - black BMW. Least we know someone's about.' He took two steps towards it, then stopped. Logan's pocket was making ringing noises again. 'Thought you switched that off?'

'I did...' And then Logan realized it wasn't his phone, it was the one Kravchenko had given him. He fumbled it out and checked the display: 'NUMBER WITHHELD' His innards clenched. 'I have to take this.'

Pirie shrugged. 'Catch up when you're done then.' He wandered away, whistling
Scotland the Brave
, and leaving a cloud of pale yellow dust in his wake.

Logan punched the green button. 'Hello?'

67

'Aye, I thought as much.'
It wasn't Kravchenko, it was Steel.
'What the hell do you think you're doing, screening out my calls? Where are you?'

'Altens.'

'Altens? You're supposed to be getting bent over a desk by that knob-end Napier, no' swanning about in sodding Altens.'

'Got a lead on Kostchey International Holdings, I'm checking it out with Pirie.' He started walking again. The black BMW was parked at the far side of the unfinished office unit, beside a couple of pallets of breeze blocks and some pantiles. No sign of the driver.

No sign of Pirie either.

'They suspend you?'

'Are you kidding, I'm like the queen of sodding Teflon Town - nothing sticks to Detective Inspector Roberta Steel. But the bastards made me call the Warsaw police and tell them your mate Wiktorja was missing.'

Logan peered in through one of the office windows, or at least the hole where one would be fitted. Nothing but bags of cement and a mixer. 'Yeah?'

'She doesn't work there anymore.'

The doorway was a big open space, so he tried inside, his shoes scuffing on the gritty concrete floor. It was just a collection of empty rooms. 'I know.'

A flight of pre-cast stairs led up to the first floor. Logan climbed them and found more unfinished rooms: bare breeze block walls, gaping doorways, carefully piled boxes of building materials.

Where the hell was Pirie?

'What do you mean, you know?'

'She told me.'

A noise echoed up from downstairs.

'She
told
you?'

Logan peered down the hole where the stairs were, opened his mouth to shout hello, then swore very, very quietly. The person walking past on the ground floor - heading for the front of the office unit - was built like a rugby player, with angular features and hair that was receding at the front but a full-on mullet at the back. Kravchenko's henchman, Grigor.

Son of a rancid bitch.

It looked as if Pirie's informant was right; only Kostchey International Holdings Limited hadn't cleared out a week ago, they were still here.

'What do you mean she told you?'

Logan crept back out of sight of the stairwell. Straining his ears to follow Mr Mullet's progress on the floor below. It sounded as if he was heading for the front door.

'Hello?'

Logan whispered as loud as he dared, 'They're here!'

'They're...? What? Have you been drinking again?'

'I've just seen Kravchenko's thug go past downstairs.'

Logan followed him, one floor up, risking a peek out of the empty window frame at the end of the corridor. Grigor was standing just outside the building, a mobile phone clamped to his ear, talking in rapid Polish.

He was huge, and probably armed as well.

Bloody hell. Where was Pirie when you needed him? And then Logan got the nasty feeling he knew exactly where Pirie was - lying battered in a corner somewhere, both hands tied behind his back, waiting for a visit from Kravchenko and his Swiss Army knife.

Logan sneaked another peek over the window ledge. 'I think Pirie might be hurt.'

'That's all I need. Where is he?'

Outside, Grigor was facing away from the building, still on his mobile, staring out towards the chain-link fence.

Logan ducked down again. 'Haven't seen him since I got here. I'll go look--'

'No! You stay where you are, you hear me? I'll get a firearms team out there.'

'I've got an idea.'

'No, no ideas!'

Logan snuck back into the shadows, pulled his Airwave handset out of his pocket and clicked it on. The upper floor was almost symmetrical around the stairwell, blank offices on either side. He picked one at random - full of scaffolding poles, bags of cement, boxes of nails - and stuck the handset in the far corner, behind a stack of wooden two-by-fours.

'Are you listening to me?'

Logan crept out of the room and into the one opposite, pausing to grab a chunk of wood on the way. 'Right,' he said, flattening himself against the wall by the door, 'call me on my Airwave thing.'

'No chance. You want to get yourself killed? I'm no' helping.'

'Just call the bloody thing.'

'No.'

'Fine, I'll get Rennie to do it.'

There was a pause and some swearing, and then,
'OK, OK. But you better get Susan pregnant for this...'

Through in the other room, Logan's Airwave handset started ringing: a high-pitched electronic warble, volume turned up full. He peered around the door frame. Come on, come on ... Bingo. Grigor was charging up the stairs.

Logan ducked back, listening to the big man's footsteps on the concrete floor, then Grigor marched into the other office.

Trying not to make any sound at all, Logan inched his way out into the corridor, clutching the length of wood like a baseball bat.

Grigor was stalking across to the far corner, gun out, pointing at the sound of the ringing. When he got to the stack of two-by-fours he stopped, stood there for a moment, then peered into the corner.

Logan waited for him to reach for the handset, then tried to take the bastard's head off with the length of wood. It crashed into Grigor's skull, just above his left ear and the big man went sprawling. The gun flew out of his hand, clanging into a neat pile of scaffolding poles.

That should hold him...

Oh God, he was getting up again.

Grigor fought his way to his knees, and then to his feet. Logan smacked him in the head a second time, but he just staggered around, blood streaming from a three-inch gash in his forehead. '
Moje jaja! Pierdolona sukinsyn...
'

'What the hell are you made of?'

His face was all twisted up, teeth bared, hissing out obscenities in Polish as he scanned the floor for the gun. And then the big man lunged, going for the pile of poles.