A Song for the Dark Times by Ian Rankin

Author:Ian Rankin [Rankin, Ian]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Detective
Publisher: Orion Publishing Group
Published: 2020-10-12T16:00:00+00:00

21

‘You,’ Cole Burnett told Benny through lips cracked with dried blood, ‘you are fucking dead, my man.’

Burnett was strapped to a rickety metal chair, the kind you’d find tossed into a skip when an office building was being refurbished. One of his eyes was swelling nicely and, stripped to his underpants by Benny, you could see where the bruises were starting to appear on his ribs and kidneys. Face pockmarked with acne; close-cropped gelled hair. It had taken longer than hoped to track him down, and then instead of getting into the car when told, the teenager had turned and fled. He was faster than Benny, and knew Moredun and Ferniehill better, heading down footpaths and across parkland, neither of which the car could deal with. After which he had become invisible. It had taken favours and a bit too much cash for Benny’s liking before the neighbourhood started to whisper in his ear. Texts came and went; rumours turned out to be unfounded. But eventually Benny had prevailed.

Not that the boss was entirely happy. The club was open for the evening, meaning Benny’d had to bring Burnett to a garage workshop down a lane near Tollcross, a garage whose roller-shutter door was seldom seen open, except in the dead of night when a car might arrive requiring a change of number plates and maybe even a paint job. Place wasn’t soundproofed, but the locals knew better than to pry or complain.

Burnett’s clothes sat in a pile near the chair. Benny had been through them, not finding much. A bit of grass and some tablets – now safely stowed in his own pockets. Couple of hundred in cash, ditto. The bank cards he’d left, along with the condom. Couldn’t take a man’s last condom – maybe Burnett would get lucky later, though Benny doubted it. He finished his latest cigarette and stubbed it out against the oil-stained concrete floor. The garage was empty tonight, the inspection pit covered over. Most of the tools were kept in a series of padlocked metal lockers, which was why Benny had brought his own bag from the boot of the Merc. It sat on a workbench, directly in Burnett’s line of sight.

‘Gie’s a smoke then,’ Burnett said, not for the first time. His other greatest hits included ‘Freezin’ here, man’ and ‘You know who I am?’ He was putting this last one to Benny yet again when Big Ger Cafferty arrived, giving Benny a moment’s withering look as he passed him on his way to the chair. The boss was dressed in a black puffa jacket, zipped to the neck. Steel-toecapped shoes, the kind you’d wear on a construction site. Black leather driving gloves. Black baseball cap. Without bothering to remove the cap, he crouched slightly so his face was level with that of the seated figure.

‘You know who I am?’ he asked.

‘You’re that cunt that used to be somebody.’

Cafferty half turned to smile in Benny’s direction. ‘Some baws on the boy, eh?’ Then he swiped Burnett’s face hard with the back of his hand.

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