Ice Into Ashes: A Scottish crime thriller (DCI James Craig Book 1) by John Carson

Author:John Carson [Carson, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-03-04T00:00:00+00:00

SEVENTEEN

Craig drove through the rain up the A82, having called Isla McGregor before he left the house. He had put on gloves and taken the papers out and into a bin liner, depositing them in the study.

He would need to sit down with Eve and tell her his thoughts and be prepared for her to laugh at him. He was glad Isla hadn’t laughed at him when he’d had her around the house. She still might if he told her about the lollipop theory.

It wasn’t the woman in reception this time but some grumpy old bastard who looked like he’d sat on a poker, and it was still up his arse.

‘Help you?’ he said in a tone that this better be good.

‘DCI James Craig, here to see DS Isla McGregor.’

‘Who?’

‘Me or Isla?’ Craig wasn’t sure who the man was confused over.

The man curled his lip. He looked to be around sixty, riding out his shifts until retirement, and this tosser who had just walked in off the street was impersonating a copper.

‘It’s okay, Tam,’ Isla said, poking her head into the reception area from the staff corridor.

‘What’s okay?’ Tam said.

‘Belligerent and fucking daft,’ Craig said to himself. Tam turned to him.

‘Daft but not deaf. You can take that fake warrant card and shove it up your arse.’

‘Tam, it’s fine. Let him in. He’s working on a case with me.’

Tam curled his lip and shuffled away after pressing the button to unlock the door, probably wishing it was a detonator button.

‘Nice meeting you, Tam,’ Craig said, walking past the doorway, trying to soften the blow he’d been dealt.

‘Sod off.’

Isla laughed as they walked along towards the lifts. ‘He’s been a fixture around here for a long time. Retirement’s calling his name, and he’s counting the days. He used to work in Dunfermline, but for some reason, he got shifted up here.’

‘I wonder why,’ Craig said, shaking his head.

‘I have the photos here,’ Craig said, reaching into his pocket. ‘There’s three of them, each in their own envelope.’ He held the three envelopes for her to see as if he was waiting for her to choose one to see if she’d won a holiday or a coffee colonic irrigation.

She took all three. ‘I’ll have them taken along to Dundee later on today,’ she said.

He realised she must have thought he was a plank, coming upstairs with her when he could have just given her the envelopes in the corridor downstairs. Maybe he subconsciously figured he would sit her down now and tell her the theory he’d had for years. It wasn’t just a theory, he reminded himself. The bastard held a lollipop stick to my eyeball, which, at the very least, would have ruptured his eye, putting an end to his career.

‘Would you have time for a coffee?’ he asked her.

She smiled and nodded. ‘Of course.’

They got out of the lift and walked along to the canteen. It was winding down for the day, so I wasn’t busy. DS Dan Stevenson was at one of the vending machines.

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