The 45% Hangover by Stuart MacBride

Author:Stuart MacBride [Stuart MacBride]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2014-11-11T05:00:00+00:00

8

Steel grabbed hold of the bar again. Burped. ‘Was it something I said?’

Everyone else went back to their drinks as Logan walked over to the bar. ‘You’re a disaster, you know that, don’t you?’

‘Maybe it’s my perfume?’

Alec Hadden had eased himself closer to the door. Another five feet and he’d be gone.

Logan grabbed a handful of his collar. ‘Oh no you don’t.’

Hadden bit his bottom lip. Didn’t struggle. ‘Sod.’

‘Think you and I need to have a little chat, don’t we, Alec? Maybe you can share your world-beating porridge recipe?’ He dragged the thin man back to the table. Pushed him down in to a seat. ‘You want to make this easy, or difficult? I’m happy either way.’

Thin fingers drifted across the tabletop. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. Maybe you’ve got me mistaken for—’

‘Chris Browning.’

‘Ah …’ He stared down at his wandering fingers. ‘Right.’

Steel lurched up to the table and thunked three large whiskies down. Rocked in her chair. ‘What we talking about?’

‘Mr Hadden is about to tell me why he paid two prostitutes to lie about Chris Browning being a regular. Weren’t you Mr Hadden?’

Silence.

‘Or would you like to do this down the station?’

He shrugged one shoulder, curling into it until his ear was pinned against his jacket. ‘It was … you know … to counteract the lies?’

‘The lies.’

‘For months, that puffed-up frog-faced git’s been on the telly and the radio and in the papers, giving it doom and gloom, yeah? We’re going to have no jobs. No currency. No defence budget. All the big companies are going to leave us. Won’t be able to pay our benefits, or pensions, or doctors. Got kinda … fed up of it.’ His shrug swapped sides. ‘Thought it’d even the scales a bit if everyone thought he liked getting it rough from a pair of hoors.’

Logan stared at him. ‘And that passes for grownup political debate where you come from, does it?’

Steel threw her head back and laughed. A proper full-throated roar that set everything jiggling. ‘You wee dancer.’ Then she slapped Hadden on the back and pushed one of the whiskies in his direction. ‘You earned it.’

He pulled on a lopsided smile. ‘Thanks.’ Then a sigh. ‘Didn’t help though, did it?’

She gave his shoulder a shoogle. ‘Cheer up. Always next time. None of this once-in-a-generation bollocks, we’ve got what …’ She turned and blinked at the TV for a bit. ‘Laz?’

‘Forty-five percent.’

‘See? Forty-five percent. All we need’s for one person in twenty to change their minds, and it’s fifty-fifty!’

The smile grew a bit. ‘Supoose.’

‘Damn right.’ She held up her glass. ‘Slàinte mhath.’

Hadden clinked his drink against hers and they drank.

Logan took the glass off him. ‘So you’re saying you had nothing to do with Chris Browning going missing?’

‘God, no. No, all I did was slip a couple of quid to Elaine and Jane. Told them to phone the Examiner and say Browning liked it rough and kinky. Honest. Ask them. And that wasn’t till after he went missing.’

Logan just stared at him.

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