Blood & Guts by Ed James (best books to read now TXT) 📕

stop it sliding up onto the verge. A long way down from up here, the lights of the city twinkling in the freezing night. Regardless, she powered on, but put her headlights on full beam to catch any more patches of black ice.

Up ahead, the monument was lit up by a high-powered torch, dancing across the stone.

Two cars sat in the small roundabout encircling it.

Vicky eased the car forward, wary of drawing Dougie McLean away, into a chase. Twenty metres away now and her headlights caught the car. A Skoda, but the light bleached it so much it was hard to tell if it was silver or not.

The other car was a battered old Vectra.

Vicky’s heart fluttered – another police pool car, the one with the buggered clutch that got stuck halfway up that no amount of oil or moaning could get fully lubricated.

Her lights caught Considine standing guard by the car, except that his torch was scanning up and down the monument, reading the names of the war dead.

Vicky pulled up, blocking the way and leaving the engine running, and got out of the car, easing on a pair of blue nitrile gloves. ‘Time and a place for that, Constable.’

He swung round and caught the light right in Vicky’s eyes.

‘Watch!’ She shielded her face, but her eyesight was a big red blur. ‘What are you playing at?’

‘Sorry, Sarge.’ Considine sniffed, then waved the torch back at the monument. ‘Just reading the names. No Considines but a couple of Doddses and a Forrester.’

‘And the car?’

‘Right. Aye. Just guarding it for you.’

‘Okay, let’s see if it’s him first.’ Vicky stepped past him and shone her own torch into the vehicle. A surge of relief climbed out of her stomach.

McLean was in the front, behind the wheel, fully reclined, phone resting on his chest. Looked like he was sleeping.

Vicky motioned for Considine to guard the passenger side, then waited as he gave up his reading exercise to do his actual job. A deep breath, then she grabbed her baton and opened the driver door. ‘Evening, sir.’

The cabin lights came on and McLean jerked forward. His phone shot over to the windscreen and his head hit the sunroof. ‘Ah, you bastard.’

‘Douglas McLean?’

He looked round at her, nodding. ‘Pleasure to meet you, darling.’

Vicky stood at the door post and grabbed McLean’s wrist, then levered his arm out and back across her hip. The combination of the pivot and McLean’s own bodyweight pulled him right out onto the ground. Vicky continued the movement with the wrist, pointing it straight up, and dug her knee into the small of his back. She snapped handcuffs on his wrist.

Considine helped him up to standing.

McLean was tall, at least six foot, and with a rower’s frame. Skinny waist forming a triangle with broad shoulders. A red musketeer moustache over a redder soul patch, covering a real shit-eating grin. And he was swaying like he’d tanned half a bottle of whisky. He frowned. ‘Usually get a lassie’s name before she pins us to the ground, doll.’

‘Detective Sergeant Vicky Dodds.’

‘And what have I done, Vicky?’

Vicky nodded at Considine. ‘You know the drill.’

Considine cleared his throat. ‘Douglas McLean, I am arresting you for the crime of rape. You do not have to say anything, but it…’

Vicky tuned out his monologue as she stepped around the car.

McLean stood there with a stupid grin on his face, like they were making a huge mistake.

Back round at the driver’s side and Considine reached a gloved hand for his phone. ‘I’ll have that, thank you very much.’

‘What?’ McLean was rubbing his forehead. ‘My phone?’

‘Is it?’ Vicky stuck it in a bag, then held it out. ‘Can you confirm this is yours?’

He looked at it for a few seconds with bleary eyes. ‘Think so. Christ, my head’s fair nipping.’

‘Why were you sleeping here, sir?’

McLean frowned. ‘Search me, like.’

‘That’ll happen soon, don’t you worry.’ Vicky caught the blue lights of a squad car piling towards them.

‘So. I should thank you for finding my phone.’

‘Assuming you ever lost it.’

Something thumped at the back of the car.

‘Anything you do say may be given in evidence. Do you understand?’

The uniforms approached them on foot now, a male and female pairing that looked like they could handle whatever Considine let McLean do to him.

Vicky stopped by the boot and listened hard. What the hell was that sound?

She ran back to the driver seat and grabbed the keys.

‘Where do you think you’re going with them?’

Vicky hit the open button and got a flash of lights from the car. She snapped out her baton and prodded the boot release button.

It clunked open.

A girl lay in the boot, barely able to move, fabric stuffed into her mouth. Eyes wide and staring right at Vicky, like she was pleading with her.

Vicky dropped her baton and ran her fingers over her wrists and ankles. Plastic cable ties, shit. She shouted over to the others, ‘Have you got a knife?’

The male officer scuttled off towards the squad car.

Vicky eased the fabric out of the girl’s mouth. ‘I’m Vicky. I’m a police officer. What’s your name?’

She was still conscious at least, but battered and bruised. ‘Teresa. My name’s Teresa Ennis. My dad’s a cop.’

13

Alison Carmichael shut the door to the room and huffed out a deep breath. ‘Well, at least she hasn’t been raped.’

Vicky nodded. Something like relief surged in her stomach. Then again, being reduced to a teenage girl not being raped feeling like relief? Christ. ‘How is she?’

‘Hard to say.’ Alison stared back down the long corridor, then out of the window to the hospital’s inner courtyard. ‘Based on my unfortunately great experience of similar cases, I would say that Teresa’s going to be okay. There’s a significant difference between her and Ms Gordon. But… Miss Ennis isn’t well. The abdominal injuries she sustained in the car boot… Who hogties someone in the back of a car?’ Anger flashed across her lips, baring teeth. ‘Who does that?’

‘We have a suspect. Same man as with Catriona Gordon’s