The Complaints by Ian Rankin

Author:Ian Rankin [RANKIN, IAN]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: FIC022000, (¯`'•.¸//(*_*)\\¸.•'´¯)
ISBN: 9780316123181
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Published: 2011-11-01T13:00:00+00:00

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2009

18

Tuesday morning, Fox was waiting for Annie Inglis outside her tenement. Duncan appeared first, slouching his way to school under the weight of his backpack. Ten minutes later, it was Inglis’s turn. Fox, seated across the road in his car, sounded his horn and waved her across. Traffic was busy—people on their way to work or dropping their kids off at the school gates. A warden had paused his scooter beside Fox’s car, but had scuttled off again when he saw that the indicators were flashing and there was someone behind the steering wheel. Annie Inglis stood her ground for a moment, and when she did cross the road she didn’t get into the car. Instead, she leaned down so her face was at the passenger-side window. Fox slid the window down.

“What are you doing here?” she asked. He handed her a business card, on the back of which was written the number of his new mobile phone.

“That’s in case you need to reach me,” he explained. “But keep it to yourself.” Then: “I need a favor, Annie.”

“Look, Malcolm…”

“It would be easier to talk if you got in. I can even give you a lift.”

“I don’t need a lift.” When he made no answer to this, she sighed and opened the door. He’d removed the candy wrappers from the passenger seat. There was a street map on the floor, which she handed to him. He tossed it into the back.

“Is it to do with Jamie Breck?” she asked.

“Gilchrist’s being obstructive.”

“You’re suspended, Malcolm! It’s not his job to help you out.”

“All the same…”

She gave another heavy sigh. “What is it you want?”

“A contact at the Australian end—someone from the team there. Name, phone number, e-mail… anything at all, really.”

“Do I get to ask why?”

“Not yet.”

She looked at him. Her work face differed from the one she wore at home—there was a little more makeup. It hardened her features.

“They’re going to know it was me,” she stated. She didn’t mean the cops in Australia; she meant Fettes.

“I’ll say it wasn’t.”

“That’s all right, then—after all, there’s no reason for them not to take you at your word, is there?”

“No reason at all,” he said with a smile.

Annie Inglis opened her door and started to get out. She was still holding his business card. “What’s the matter with your old phone?” she asked. Then: “No… on second thoughts, I really don’t want to know.” She closed the door after her and crossed the road again, unlocking her own car.

It took Fox five minutes to drive to the café on Morningside Road, but another five to find a parking space. He put enough coins in the meter for an hour, and walked the short distance to his destination. Jamie Breck was already there, plugging his laptop into one of the power sockets next to the corner table he’d secured.

“Just got here,” he told Fox as the two men shook hands.

“How are you feeling?”

“I didn’t get much sleep, thanks to your confession.”

Fox’s mouth twitched at the word.

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