Still Midnight by Denise Mina

Author:Denise Mina
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Orion Publishing Group

20

When they opened the door to Shugie’s bedroom the little man was sitting as they had left him, upright on the bed, but something was wrong: the corners of the pillowcase met his corners. He looked too tidy. He’d taken it off and put it back on again, which was bad, but his posture troubled them more: he sat confidently, shoulders down, head up, facing them, not cowering. His head swivelled as he looked from one to the other through the pillowcase, his bearing so upright they both felt inexplicably afraid, as if it was a rehearsal for meeting them in court. It was creepy because his bearing made him seem human.

Eddy looked at Pat, glanced at the crack in the curtains, looked back at the confident man. Pillowcase knew the police had been there. He had been at the window and seen them or heard them downstairs and thought they were coming to save him, banged on the floor deliberately to fuck them up.

Pat could feel Eddy’s rage rise like a scream in a pitch too high to hear. Eddy stepped towards the bed, teeth bared, out of control and grabbed the man by the forearm, shaking him hard, toppling him face down into the mattress, twisting his arm up his back hard, the way the police did. The old man gave a squeal, ‘no’ or ‘ah’, but it was high anyway, shocked, not what he had expected. Pinning him face down on the bed, Eddy raised his other elbow high and jabbed a short punch into his kidney. The old man buckled and collapsed, groaning, the gush of air muffled in the mattress. Eddy punched again and again, hitting the soft skin on his back, missing the ribs deliberately, going for the soft tissue.

Pat looked away for part of the attack. Then he thought Eddy might see him looking elsewhere and forced his eyes onto the pillowcase. It twitched out a response to the blows.

Eddy stood unsteadily on the bed, over the body, saliva flecked on his chin, panting like a child on a bouncy castle. He was fighting off a smile. Pat watched as he wiped it away with the back of his hand. It was odd to enjoy it so much. A bit sadistic. You could kill a man doing that to him.

He looked down at the pillowcase, thinking vaguely about internal bleeding and the mysteries of the human body. If Eddy killed it he would have to sort out getting rid of the body, Pat wasn’t going to do it, he hadn’t laid a finger on him. But then Eddy would probably give a body to Shugie or some other arsehole and they’d get done for it.

As an afterthought the old man gave a twitch, raising his buttocks up in a futile attempt to get away, and he slumped back, face down on the bed.

Suddenly stern, Eddy gestured to the other side of the bed. Pat shuffled over and they took an arm each and dragged the pillowcase off the bed, trying to stand him up on his cloth legs.

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