Dirge for the Girl: A Logan Thorne DCI Scottish Detective Thriller by Duncan Wallace

Author:Duncan Wallace [Wallace, Duncan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-01-13T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

“We need to bring him in,” I said.

A liquefying head rush engulfed me, and I breathed through the adrenaline as I stood up from my crouch.

“No, we don’t, sir,” Harding said in a slow voice.

“What?” I asked in outrage. “Did you see that argument? Olivia looked scared to death of him.”

“No, I mean, Max Brenner is here,” she nodded to the Incident Room, and I followed her gaze.

Max shuffled awkwardly by the back wall with his eyes fixed on his beat-up converse trainers. I realised he was trying not to look at the large corkboard which was covered in pictures of Olivia, including images from the scene. I yanked the door open, rushed over, and yanked the board from the wall. I turned the board around so the pictures and reports were hidden and then turned to glare at the nearby cops. They scattered like pigeons as they caught my eye.

“Clean up after yourselves!” I barked.

DI Getty peered around her office door at the commotion. She wiggled her eyebrows at me, but I ignored her and breathed hard. Invite the boyfriend and possible suspect into the heart of the investigation and force him to look at pictures of his dead girlfriend, not to mention confidential evidence? How could they be so idiotic?

“Max,” I said finally. “What are you doing here?”

“DS Bradley called me,” he replied in surprise. “He wanted to see how I was doing and asked me in.”

The boy looked relieved that Olivia’s face had been removed from his orbit as he finally tore his eyes from his trainers.

I scanned the room and saw Bradley leaving Getty’s office. He winked at me and then nodded at the kid. Had he pulled Max in under false pretenses? How could he know that we wanted to talk to him? The cop looked pleased as though he’d done me a favour. But now that Max was at the station, I could put those thoughts on the worry back burner for later.

“Can you come with me?” I asked Brenner.

He nodded, as though he was desperate to be anywhere other than that room with the pictures of his dead girlfriend, even if it meant being led away by a DCI. I couldn’t work out if it was grief, or if he felt remorse over what he’d done and so couldn’t look at the proof. I’d have to watch him closely.

“Interesting t-shirt,” I said as we walked back to the Conference Room.

The teen wore a black Slipknot shirt with a warped skull on the front. Plenty of kids wore the same thing every day, but it somehow felt inappropriate when his girlfriend had just died. Max looked down as if to remember his choice of clothing that day, and he looked surprised for a moment to see what he had on.

“They’re my favourite band,” he said defensively.

I pointed Max towards a chair, and he sat down, nodding at Harding as he did so.

“So, what’s this about?” he demanded. “Did Bradley trick me into coming?

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