“You okay, Jazz?” Francis Gray asked.
“Far from it, Francis. This little bitch has just accused me of shagging some old pro I arrested once in Dundee!”
Francis Gray stepped into the room, closing the door softly behind him. “Say that again,” he growled, eyes reduced to slits which were concentrated on Siobhan.
“All I’m trying to say is —”
“You better be careful what you say, dyke-features. Anybody starts bad-mouthing Jazz, they’ve got me to contend with, and I make Jazz here look like a pussy, though probably not the kind of pussy that interests you.”
Siobhan’s face was suffusing with color. “Now hang on a minute,” she spat, trying to control the tremor in her voice. “Before the pair of you go flying off the handle . . .”
“Did Rebus put you up to this?” McCullough was snarling, fingers of both hands pointed at her as though they were six-shooters. “Because if he did . . .”
“DI Rebus doesn’t even know I’m here!” Siobhan said, her voice rising. The two men seemed to glance at one another, and she couldn’t tell what they were thinking. Gray stood between her and the door. She didn’t think she was going to get past him in a hurry.
“Best thing you can do,” McCullough was warning her, “is head back to your burrow and dig yourself in for the winter. You start telling tales, you could be headed for your chief constable’s cooking pot.”
“I think Jazz, as usual, is being too generous in his predictions,” Gray said, with quiet menace. He’d just taken half a step towards her and away from the door when it flew open, catching him in the back. Rebus had shouldered it, and was now standing there, surveying the scene.
“Sorry to crash the party,” he said.
“What do you think you’re trying to pull, Rebus? Reckon you could drag your little girlfriend here into those paranoid fantasies of yours?”
Rebus looked at Jazz. He seemed upset, but Rebus couldn’t tell how genuine it was, or what its cause might be. It was just as easy to be upset when maligned as when found out.
“You finished asking questions, Siobhan?” When she nodded, Rebus stuck out his thumb and jabbed it over his shoulder, letting her know it was time to leave. She hesitated, not liking the idea of him bossing her around. Then she gave McCullough and Gray the same withering stare, and squeezed past Rebus, striding down the corridor without looking back.
Gray offered Rebus a wicked grin. “Want to shut that door again, John? Sort things out here and now?”
“Don’t tempt me.”
“Why not? Just you and me. We’ll leave Jazz out of it.”
Rebus’s fingers were around the door handle. He didn’t know what was about to happen, but started pushing the door closed anyway, watching as Gray’s grin widened, showing yellow, glinting teeth.
Then a fist rapped on the other side of the door, and Rebus let it swing open again.
“Getting all cozy in here?” Bobby Hogan said. “I’ll have no goldbricking on my shift.”
“Just conferencing,” Jazz McCullough said, face and voice suddenly back to normal. Gray had his own face lowered, pretending to adjust his necktie. Hogan looked at the three men, knowing something had been going on.
“Well,” he said, “conference your arses out of here and back to what we in the human world call work.”
The human world. . . Rebus wondered if Hogan would ever know how close to the mark he’d been. In this room, for a matter of seconds, three men had been reconciled to acting like something less than human . . .
“Sure thing, DI Hogan,” Jazz McCullough said, picking up his folder and readying to leave the office. Gray’s eyes caught Rebus’s, and Rebus could see the man was having a hard time pulling himself back. It was like watching Edward Hyde decide he no longer needed Henry Jekyll. Rebus had told Jazz that there was still the chance for resurrection, but not in Francis Gray’s case. Something had died behind his eyes, and Rebus didn’t think he’d be seeing it again.
“After you, John,” McCullough was saying with a sweep of his arm. As he followed Hogan out of the room, Rebus could feel a tingling all down his spine, as though a blade were about to lodge itself there . . .
26
There was a tapping at Siobhan’s window. It took her a moment to work out where she was: the St. Leonard’s car park. She must have driven there from Leith; couldn’t remember anything about it. How long had she been sitting? It could have been half a minute or half an hour. More tapping. She got out of the car.
“What’s up, Derek?”
“Shouldn’t that be my question? You’re sitting there like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Not a ghost, no.”
“What then? Has something happened?”
She shook her head, as if trying to clear it of the memory of that office . . . Gray and McCullough . . .
Rebus had warned her, and she’d gone blundering in anyway with her sweeping accusations and half-formed questions. It was hardly what they taught you at Tulliallan. Even so, the reactions of McCullough and Gray had been startling: McCullough’s sudden anger, Gray’s snarling defense of his colleague. She’d expected a response, yes, but nothing quite so feral. It was as if the two men had been unraveling in front of her eyes.
“I’m fine,” she told Linford. “Just in a dream, that’s all.”
“Sure?”
“Look, Derek . . . ” Her voice had hardened. She rubbed at a throbbing spot on her right temple.
“Siobhan . . . I am trying to mend the fence between us.”
“I know you are, Derek. But this isn’t the time, okay?”
“Okay.” He held up both hands in surrender. “But you know I’m there for you if you need me.” She managed to nod her head. He shrugged, prefacing a change of subject. “Friday night tonight. Shame you’ve got that date. I was going to suggest dinner at the Wichery . . .”
“Another time maybe.” She couldn’t believe she was saying this. I don’t want to make any more enemies . . . Linford was smiling.
“I’ll hold you to that.”
She nodded again. “I have to go to the office now . . .”
Linford checked his watch. “I’m out of here. Might be back before the close of play. Otherwise, have a great weekend.” He seemed to think of something. “Maybe we could do something together.”
“I need a bit more notice than that, Derek.” The throbbing was getting worse. Why wouldn’t he just go? She turned and walked towards the station’s rear door. He’d be standing there . . . watching her . . . waiting for her to turn so he could try out another sympathetic smile.
No chance.
Upstairs in the murder room, things were winding down. The team had been given the weekend off en masse. The Procurator Fiscal’s office was happy enough with the case as it stood. They’d have more questions, more information they needed come Monday morning. But for now, everyone was relaxing. There was still paperwork to contend with, still loose ends to be gathered together and tied as tight as possible.
It could all wait till Monday.
Siobhan sat at her desk, staring at the cover sheet of the Dundee fax. When she looked up, Hynds was moving in her direction. She could see by the look on his face that he was going to ask if anything was wrong. She held up a finger, warning him off. He stopped, shrugged and turned away. She started reading the text of the fax one more time, willing something — anything — to jump out at her. She supposed she could try talking to Ellen Dempsey, see if she’d let anything slip.
So what? she wondered. What difference did it make if McCullough did connect to Ellen Dempsey? It certainly seemed to make a difference to him. She knew almost nothing about McCullough and didn’t have any contacts in Dundee who could enlighten her. Then she turned back to the cover sheet.
To: DS Clarke, Lothian and Borders