The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
“The temperature in the hallway plummeted as the two women stared at each other in silence
T hen they’d been thrown out of the pub by the cleaners. God only knew what time it was in the morning, and there’d be a fair few sore heads in the station come shift change.
Had he suggested whisky at his place, or had it been Grumpy Bob?
That memory was a little hazy, but he did recall thinking that company of any sort would be better than returning to the cold, empty, silent flat alone.
So a gang of them had come back, and most likely finished off his entire supply of malt. That, at least, would explain the pounding in his head.
Trying not to groan, Mclean rolled over and out of bed. He was still wearing his boxer shorts, which was something.
His suit was folded over the back of the chair, his shirt and socks in the laundry basket. These were automatic things; he didn’t have to think about the routine.
But equally, he wouldn’t have been so conscientious had he been half cut the night before, or gripped in a fever of unlikely passion.
And the more he thought about it, the more he remembered going to bed alone.
Grumpy Bob had stayed the course, but Macbride had passed out on the floor, and Emma?
Yes, Emma had fallen asleep in the armchair. He’d dug a blanket out of the cupboard and draped it over her before putting himself to bed.
She must have woken up in the night and crawled in under his duvet. Well, that said something pretty loud and clear.
Bruises
The shower managed to shift some of the grey fog from his mind, but he was still slow when he stepped out and dried himself down.
His cracked ribs protested, the bruise around his torso turning yellow at the edges.
Towel round his middle, he filled the kettle and set it to boil.
Then, taking a deep breath, he went back into his bedroom. Emma was still asleep, but she had rolled over, throwing the duvet askance.
Her short black hair covered her face, but pretty much everything else was on view.
A trail of clothes covered the floor from door to bedside; items of underwear he’d not seen in a good few years. Not this side of a crime scene, anyway.
As quietly as he could, he gathered up his suit, fetched a shirt and a clean set of underclothes from the wardrobe, and retreated to his study to dress.
The Dictaphone sat on his desk, accusing him of callous disregard for the memory of the dead. He ignored that part of his mind, knowing it was just self-indulgence, a protective cocoon of guilt. He knew he’d never throw away the tape, just as he knew he would never forget Kirsty.
But perhaps after all these years he really should be taking the advice of all his friends and trying to move on. Bad stuff happened in the world, but sometimes things came good. They’d found Chloe Spiers alive, after all.
Dressed, he went through to the kitchen and made coffee. The carton of milk in the fridge hadn’t yet given birth, but it would need inducing soon if it wasn’t going to explode.
Poking his head into the living room and the spare bedroom revealed one sleeping detective constable and one snoring detective sergeant, both of whom would need coffee and bacon butties.
He grabbed his keys from the table in the hall and headed out to the corner shop.
By the time he had returned, the bathroom door was firmly closed and the sound of the shower running hissed through it.
Stumbled
Grumpy Bob sat at the kitchen table looking like he’d slept in his suit, and as Mclean began making bacon butties, DC Macbride stumbled in, looking slightly nervous.
“Morning, constable,” Mclean said, noting how Macbride winced in pain at the sound. Well, fair enough. He’d drunk the most. But his liver was still young. He’d survive.
“What was I drinking last night?” he asked.
“In the pub, or here?” Grumpy Bob scratched at his chin. He’d be needing the electric razor he kept in his locker at the station.
Confusion spread across Macbride’s face, but before he could say anything, a light knocking came at the door.
“Take over the butties, Bob. There’s brown sauce in the cupboard.”
Mclean went through to the hall and opened the door. Jenny Spiers stood on the communal landing. “Tony, I... ”
“Jenny. Hi... ”
They both spoke at the same time, then both stopped speaking to let the other one go first. Mclean moved aside from the door. “Come on in. I was just making bacon butties.”
Before he could say any more, she had wrapped him in a huge embrace. “Thank you for finding my baby,” she said. Then burst into hysterical sobs.
Emma chose that moment to come out of the bathroom. She was wearing Mclean’s old towelling dressing gown, which revealed rather more thigh than perhaps it should have done.
Her hair was spiky where she had rubbed it dry, and she smelled strongly of tea tree oil shampoo.
The temperature in the hallway plummeted as the two women stared at each other in silence.
Mclean could feel Jenny tense as she still held on to him.
“Umm. Jenny, this is Emma. Emma, Jenny.” The tension didn’t ease.
Then a voice shouted, “Coming through!” and DC Macbride stumbled out of the kitchen, pushing past Emma on his way into the bathroom.
Slammed
The door slammed and behind it they could all hear the noise of the toilet seat being lifted, followed by quiet retching.
“We had a bit of a party last night.” Mclean tried to tactfully extract himself from Jenny’s embrace, though she seemed reluctant to let him go.
“It looks like young Detective Constable Macbride may have had a little too much cask-strength Bowmore.”
“More likely the tequila slammers he had in the pub,” Emma said, and padded off in the direction of Mclean’s bedroom.
“How is Chloe, by the way?” He asked, hoping to distract Jenny, whose gaze had followed the other woman with a sort of haunted, disbelieving look.
She dragged her attention back to him, fixed a smile onto her face.
“The doctors say she’ll be fine, physically. She was badly dehydrated when you found her. Thank God you did. I really don’t know how to thank you enough.”
“It’s my job, Jenny.” Mclean steered her into the kitchen, where Grumpy Bob was standing at the cooker wearing a long apron with an amusing bikini motif printed on it.
“I just don’t know how she’ll cope mentally. Being chained up like that. With a corpse.”
More on Monday