Siobhan nodded. “There was a name mentioned . . . one of your colleagues. I may have to ask him a few questions.”
“And?”
Siobhan shrugged. “And I was just wondering what he was like. His name’s James McCullough. He’s a DI. Maybe you know someone who can give me a bit of background?”
Hetherington studied Siobhan over her glass. Siobhan wasn’t sure she was falling for the line she’d just spun. Maybe it wouldn’t matter.
“You want to know about Jazz McCullough?”
Meaning Hetherington knew him. “I just want to know how he’ll react if I ask him some questions. Forewarned is forearmed and all that . . .”
“And knowledge is power?” She watched Siobhan shrug again, then gestured towards her drink. “You need a refill.”
Siobhan knew Hetherington was giving herself time. “Lime and soda,” she said.
“Want a gin or anything in that?”
“I’m driving.” Siobhan stared down at her near-empty glass. “Go on then,” she said.
Hetherington smiled and headed for the bar.
When she came back, she’d made her decision. She’d also bought two packets of dry-roasted peanuts.
“Sustenance,” she said, placing them on the ledge. Then, as she sat down again: “The hunters are out.”
Siobhan nodded. She’d seen them: men’s eyes assessing her. Men from the office parties, but also men at the bar. They did, after all, appear to be two women at the start of a night out, making them possible prey . . .
“Good luck to them,” Siobhan said.
“Here’s to professional women,” Hetherington said, chinking glasses. Then she paused. “You don’t realize how lucky you are.”
“Oh?”
“I mean, maybe it isn’t luck. Could be it’s instinct or kismet or something.” She paused to sip her drink. “There are plenty of people in CID who know Jazz McCullough, and some of them might even be willing to talk to you. But not many would say very much.”
“He has a lot of friends?”
“He’s made a lot of friends. Plenty of favors he’s done for people down the years.”
“But you’re not one of them?”
“I’ve worked with him a couple of times in the past. He acted like I was invisible, which, as you can imagine, is quite a feat.”
Siobhan could well imagine it: she reckoned Hetherington was probably a good half-inch taller than McCullough, maybe more.
“He didn’t like you?”
Hetherington shook her head. “I don’t think it went that far. He just didn’t think I was necessary.”
“Because you’re a woman?”
Hetherington shrugged. “Maybe.” She lifted her glass again. “So don’t expect him to welcome you with open arms.”
“I won’t.” Siobhan thought back to the scene in Leith and had to suppress a shiver. The alcohol seemed to surge through her. She lifted a handful of nuts to her mouth.
“What is it you need to ask him anyway?”
“The notes you sent me . . .”
“I forget the woman’s name.”
“Ellen Dempsey. McCullough arrested her a couple of times. Once for prostitution, then again for using mace against someone in a taxi. Dempsey may be part of a case I’m working.”
“What’s it got to do with McCullough?”
“Probably nothing, but I need to ask anyway.”
Hetherington nodded her understanding. “Well, I’ve told you what I know about Jazz . . .”
“You haven’t mentioned that he’s on a course at Tulliallan.”
“Oh, you know about that? Jazz isn’t always very good at following orders.”
“A colleague of mine in Edinburgh’s just the same. Happens to be at Tulliallan too.”
“Which is why you know Jazz is there? It’s not that I was covering up for him, Siobhan. I just didn’t see how it was relevant.”
“Everything’s relevant, Liz,” Siobhan told her. “My feeling — strictly between us” — she waited until Hetherington had nodded her agreement — “is that McCullough may have kept in touch with this Ellen Dempsey character after she left Dundee.”
“Kept in touch in what way?”
“To the extent that he may want to protect her.”
Hetherington was thoughtful for a moment. “I’m not sure I can help. I know he’s married with kids, one of them grown up and studying at university.” She paused. “There’s some sort of separation going on . . .”
“Oh?”
Hetherington winced. “This is going to sound like me having a go at him . . .”
“Not as far as I’m concerned, Liz.” Siobhan waited for her to speak.
Hetherington let out a sigh. “He moved out a couple of months back, according to the rumor mill. Still goes round there . . . I think he moved into a flat only a couple of streets away.”
“He lives in the city?”
Hetherington shook her head. “Just outside, in Broughty Ferry.”
“On the coast?”
Hetherington nodded. “Look, I really don’t want to speak bad of the guy. If you talked to a dozen detectives, you’d hardly find anyone with a —”
“But he has a problem with authority?”
“He just happens to think he knows more than them. Who’s to say he’s wrong?”
“Reminds me of that colleague again,” Siobhan said with a smile.
“Hey, girls, looks like you could do with another drink.” Two men were approaching, pint glasses in hands. They wore jackets, ties and wedding rings.
“Not tonight, fellas,” Hetherington told them. The one who’d spoken gave a shrug.
“Only asking,” he said. Hetherington waved them good-bye.
“Maybe there’s somewhere else you prefer?” Siobhan asked her.
“I really need to be getting home.” She tugged at her watch strap. “If you need to talk to Jazz, just dive in and do it. He won’t bite.”
Siobhan didn’t like to say that she wasn’t sure about that.
They were heading in different directions, so they shook hands outside the pub. The two men followed them out. “Where you lassies off to then?”
“Never mind us, just get on home to your wives.”
The men glowered, then slouched off, muttering curses.
“Thanks for your help, Liz,” Siobhan said.
“I’m not sure I’ve done much.”
“You gave me an excuse to get out of Edinburgh.”
Hetherington nodded, as though she could understand. “Come see us again sometime, DS Clarke.”
“I’ll do that, DS Hetherington.”
She watched the tall, confident figure striding away from her. Hetherington sensed it, threw a wave without bothering to look back.
Siobhan walked downhill to where she’d parked her car. The sky was losing light as she snaked her way back towards the motorway, replacing REM with Boards of Canada. When her mobile rang, she knew instinctively who it would be.
“How was the rest of your day?” she asked.
“I survived,” Rebus told her. “Sorry I couldn’t talk earlier.”
“You were in the same room as them?”
“And sticking as close to Bobby Hogan as I could. You managed to get under Jazz McCullough’s skin — I’m impressed.”
“I should have taken your advice and steered clear.”
“I’m not so sure about that.”
“John . . . are you ready yet to tell me what the hell’s going on?”
“Maybe.”
“I’m not doing anything else for the next hour.”
There was a long silence on the line. “This has got to stay between us,” he told her.
“You know you can trust me.”
“Like I trusted you to stay away from McCullough?”
“That was more in the way of advice,” she said with a grin.
“Well, all right then. If you’re sitting comfortably . . .”
“I’m ready.”
Another silence, and then Rebus’s voice, sounding eerily disembodied. “Once upon a time, in a land far away, there was a king called Strathern. And one day, he called one of his errant knights to him with news of a perilous quest . . .”
Rebus paced his living room as he told Siobhan the story, or as much of it as he felt she needed. He’d clocked off early and come straight home, but now the place felt like a trap. He kept peering from the window, wondering if someone was waiting for him below. The front door was locked, but that wouldn’t keep anyone out. The joiner had replaced the doorjamb, but without adding any extra reinforcement. Another chisel or crowbar would open it as effortlessly as a key. The lights were off throughout the flat, but Rebus wasn’t sure he felt any safer in the darkness.