Dyed in the Wool (21 page)

"Right, good. Tell Cargill." Cullen ended the call and made his way over to Methven and Wilkinson. He got between them, angling his body to face Methven. "We've got something."

Methven finally acknowledged him. "What is it?"

Cullen held up his phone, showing the black and white image of the Range Rover. "Buxton's just finished the CCTV review of Smith's car. Looks like it visited a lock-up in Ravencraig before it went to the top of the bing. Uniform are already on their way over."

"This is good work." Methven scowled at Wilkinson. "Inspector, you can have the witness."

Wilkinson let his folded arms go. "After all that bloody nonsense from you?"

"Take it up with DI Cargill." Methven turned to Cullen. "Come on. Let's go" He raced off down the corridor.

As Methven unlocked his car, Cullen's phone rang. PC Green.

"Scott, where are you?"

"Still at Bathgate station. Why?"

"Hurry up. The garages are on fire."

Methven bombed into the outskirts of Ravencraig. "Why the sodding hell did some bugger set them on fire?"

"Might be innocent."

"I doubt it." Methven turned the sharp bend. "Nice to see you finally playing the same game as the rest of us. Your reputation precedes you. You're a loose cannon. You're not a team player."

"Is this coming from Bain?"

Methven glared at him. "Not just from DI sodding Bain. I've spoken to a number of officers about you. I know what happened between you and DS Irvine. I know you didn't toe the line in three major cases."

"I think you'll find in all those cases, I got results."

"DI Cargill doesn't sodding like cowboys." Methven focused more on Cullen than the road. "You might think you've got results, but you've undermined the police service. We need to make sure we're above board, that everything has an audit trail and the PF has a clear path to prosecution." His hands tightened on the steering wheel. "We don't want Acting DCs being stabbed or hit with hammers."

"I didn't get back up in either case."

"Then you should have waited."

"I would've had two extra victims."

"This isn't a game, Constable. Two wrongs don't make a right. You can't equate saving two members of the public with losing an Acting DC. You need to do things in a safe and controlled manner."

Cullen slouched back in his seat. "I'll bear that in mind."

They pulled up alongside a Lothian & Borders Volvo, twenty metres away from the burning lock-ups. Twenty-foot high flames burst out of the roofs.

Green was speaking into his Airwave.

Cullen got out of the car and jogged over.

"What the sodding hell happened here?"

"Fire service is on its way from Bathgate." Green reattached his Airwave to his vest. "It was burning when we arrived."

"And when the sodding hell did you get here?"

"We just arrived, Sarge."

"Where were you? ADC Buxton called this in ages ago."

Kieron Bain got out of the car. "We needed to get approval from our sergeant."

Methven spun round to focus on him. "No, you sodding didn't. You're both allocated to this investigation."

"We're not. Our inspector unassigned us first thing this morning."

Methven stood there, nostrils flaring. "This is not good form. I'm going to speak to your inspector about this."

"We've got to follow protocol." Green folded his arms. "We've got two major murder investigations to support as well as actually doing our day jobs."

"What's the other investigation?"

"We're allocated to DI Wilkinson."

"Bloody hell." Methven rubbed his eyebrows. "What happened when you finally turned up here?"

"It was well alight. Looked like it had been burning for about twenty minutes, maybe longer."

"Was there anybody around?"

Kieron shook his head. "Nobody."

"Hmm." Methven got out his notebook before pointing at Green and Kieron. "You two stay here and support the fire service." He looked at Cullen. "Get ADC Buxton to investigate the ownership of the garages."

"Will do." Cullen scribbled it down. "What about me?"

"Can you get the latest CCTV tapes of this place and see who was here in the last hour?"

*
*
*

"What is it?" Methven was sitting in the corner of the Incident Room, tapping on a laptop, not even looking up at Cullen.

He held up a wad of photographs. "Finished the CCTV search just before the fire. Got a very loose lead."

Methven grabbed the photos, spending a few seconds looking through them. "Doesn't show a great deal, does it?"

"We could get those four boys in hoodies brought in." Cullen pointed to a few shots showing kids running away from the garages, across the adjacent waste ground.

"Good shout." Methven sighed as he put them down before shutting the lid on the laptop. "It feels a bit of a coincidence, that's all. You find out the car was taken there and within an hour the whole lot's up in flames."

"I thought that as well. The only people who knew were you, me, Buxton, DI Cargill and PC Green."

"Plus Green's sergeant and half that bloody station. Who was that kid with him? Looked familiar."

Cullen hesitated. He hadn't told anyone Bain's son was even on the force, let alone the same case. "It's Kieron Bain, works out of Ravencraig."

"Any relation?"

Cullen rubbed his forehead. "His son."

Methven slammed his fist down on the desk. "You know the sodding rules around this. He was the First Attending Officer at the bing, wasn't he?"

"He was."

"Why haven't you told me this before?"

"It's in the file. He's supposed to be off the case."

Methven spoke with his eyes shut. "Don't you think DI Cargill or I should've been informed?"

"I'm not hiding anything."

"Like hell you are." Methven opened his eyes. "You know I've been brought in here to stop this sort of nonsense. You and Bain and Irvine, you're all the same. Bloody cowboys."

"With all due respect, we're not the same."

Methven sneered at Cullen. "Get out of my sodding sight. I'll take this up with DI Cargill."

Cullen checked his watch - twenty past six. "I'm going home."

"Fine by me." Methven opened his laptop. "Might solve this case if we've not got you making a mess of it."

The flat was empty when Cullen got home. He sat at the dining table and switched on the TV. The One Show - the worst concept for a TV programme ever, which seemed to be "don't have a concept". Sharon loved it. Maybe that was why he hated it.

He went through the other channels. Nothing.

He gave a deep sigh. How did people fill evenings watching TV? He'd never had a problem finding stuff to do, but he was at a loose end now.

He was hungry. Maybe he should go to the Co-op for something healthy, rather than the usual pizza or curry. A shish kebab wasn't too unhealthy - vegetables and protein.

The front door opened and Rich walked in, wearing his black work suit with grey shirt and black tie.

"You look very nineties there, Rich."

Rich scowled. "Whatever."

Cullen turned off the TV. "Bad day?"

"Insurance company are being dicks about my phone. It's my life in there. Only good thing is it's cancelled and everything's backed up, so I can just get a new one." He sat next to Cullen. "You're home early."

"Had a shite day myself."

"Sharon?"

"That's only part of it. The DS I'm working with just now is a total fanny and he's got it in for me."

"They're all like that, aren't they?" Rich grinned. "What have you done this time?"

Cullen threw his hands in the air. "Nothing. I've worked my arse off today. He's just picking on me."

"I believe you. Pint?"

*
*
*

The bell rang. "Last orders!"

Rich swirled his pint glass. "One for the road?"

Cullen checked the time - just after eleven. They were pretty much the only ones left. "Aye, fuck it. One more pint isn't going to make it that much worse tomorrow."

Rich headed to the bar.

Cullen looked across the Dalriada, a pub-cum-restaurant in an old Victorian mansion at the far end of the promenade in Portobello. Their plates were still on the table - steak and chips for Cullen, tomato pasta for Rich - alongside several empty pint glasses.

He couldn't believe he'd spent his first working night as a single man getting pissed with Rich. What had Sharon done?

Rich put the two pints on the table. "Here you go. Better drink up - the barman wasn't impressed. Poor guy looks like he just wants to go home."

"Fine."

"What's up?"

"Don't know. Sharon, probably."

"Right, so you do miss her?"

"I think so. It's only been a weekend. Can't believe it's been so short a space of time. I must look like a total pussy."

Rich held his hands up. "Hey, I'm all for guys showing their sensitive side. I'm not Tom, you know?"

Cullen smiled. "Thanks. It's just I feel she's taken our future away. I was going to move in with her. We had a holiday booked. I can't bloody believe it."

"Must hurt, right?"

"Like you'd know."

"Just try me."

"Spit it out."

"Look, Scott, the reason I moved back up here was this guy I'd been seeing in London. Andrew. Third generation Greek. Real Adonis type, you know?" Rich took a big gulp of his beer. "Thing was, he'd been fucking guys at the gym. He'd been lying to me all that time. It was going on for months, must've been about twenty blokes."

"You've never told me this."

"I preferred my return north to be shrouded in mystery."

"So, basically, you know what it's like being lied to?"

Rich looked away. "It's not just that. Sharon's lie was kind of safe, in a way."

Cullen pointed a finger at him. "Watch where you're going with this."

Rich held his hands up. "Stop being such a bloody princess. I'm serious. Andrew was fucking loads of blokes in a gay gym. Just think about that. Those guys could have had anything. He was bringing that into our home."

Cullen slowly nodded. "Oh shit. Are you… you know?"

"Am I what?" Rich folded his arms.

"HIV positive."

"I've had a test, if that's what you mean. Had three, in fact, just to be sure." Rich took another swig of beer before looking away. "Relax, I've not got AIDS."

Cullen breathed a sigh of relief. "I suppose Sharon's betrayal's nothing compared to that."

"Aye. She used to go out with a woman. Big deal. I know a few blokes who'd be turned on by that sort of thing, or at least say they were."

Cullen glowered. "Not me."

"I suppose you're quite traditional." Rich nodded at his eyebrow. "Where did you get that scratch from?"

Cullen tugged his hair down. "I got into a fight on Saturday."

"What sort of a fight?"

"I went to the Hibs match with a mate. We were going for a pint when we got jumped by some neds in tracksuits."

Rich smirked. "Really? Local hero cop assaulted by neds?"

"Aye, very good. They almost opened the wound in my shoulder."

"What are you going to do about it?"

"Still haven't decided."

"Which pretty much means do nothing, right?"

"Yeah."

Cullen sat in silence, thinking through his options. He didn't like getting battered by casuals. He didn't like the fact they knew Derek Miller. "I can't make my mind up about how to deal with it."

"How do you mean?"

"I'm enough of a laughing stock at the station because of Sharon. Being jumped by some neds wouldn't be great."

"Still, you can't like those fuckers getting away with it, can you?"

"No." Cullen needed to speak to Derek again.

Rich leaned forward. "You in early tomorrow?"

"Usual time. Why?"

"You fancy going to a club?"

*
*
*

The music was loud and the Liquid Lounge was busy for a Tuesday. Rich and Cullen worked the dance floor, prowling it like a pair of panthers, at least in Cullen's head.

As they danced, Rich had his eyes on a tall, athletic guy wearing a suit, vaguely reminiscent of a young Ewan McGregor.

Above the thumping beats of a Fatboy Slim track, Rich shouted in his ear. "More shots?"

"Thought you had your eyes on that bloke?"

"It's not him I'm worried about. It's her again." Rich gestured in the opposite direction - a girl in her mid-twenties had been staring at Cullen since they arrived.

Cullen quickly formulated a plan. "More Jaegerbombs?"

"Slag bombs."

Cullen grinned. "Back in a minute." As he left the thud of the dance floor, he clocked the girl again - not bad. Not bad at all.

Rich made his move, reminding him of a nature documentary where a lion attacks a wildebeest.

He made for the bar, a long dark room with booths opposite, leaning against it with a twenty pound note out, like some mid-nineties City trader.

"Aye?"

"Two slag bombs." Cullen waited while the barman poured the booze and squeezed the can.

"Hey there."

Cullen spun round. The girl from the dance floor, definitely after him. "Hey."

"You can really dance." She was absolutely banjaxed.

"Thanks. I try my best."

She stood there, eyes wide. He held out his hand. "Scott."

"Katie."

Cullen tried to smile. He'd loved that name until a girl with it totally destroyed his heart.

She leaned close. "Pretty busy for a Monday night."

"Yeah. Why are you here tonight?"

"I'm a nurse. Tomorrow's my day off."

"Right." Cullen nodded.

"What about you?"

"Oh, I'm just a piss head."

She laughed hard, perhaps too hard.

Cullen could feel the old magic coming back. He looked at her again - she was mid-to-late twenties. Dark hair hanging loose. She was curvy with a slim waist. Tall. His type.

A couple in a booth opposite were grabbed by a bouncer, pushing them towards the exit. The guy struggled to do his flies up, the girl adjusting her skirt.

Katie giggled. "What do you think they were up to?"