Beast of Burden (19 page)

Which makes me wonder how much he already knows.

“I talked … to him. Yes.”

“You want a seat?”

Shake my head. “Rather stand. If you don't mind.”

“No.”

“Can be a little …
difficult
. To get up again.” I try a smile, defuse the tension, but it doesn't work. Clear my throat. “I saw my … police contact.”

Tiernan moves one hand like I should continue.

“He told me some things.”

“Which were?”

I look at the floor. “They have leads.”

“Who?”

“Wouldn't tell me.”

“Then what the fuck good is he?”

I look up. Tiernan's hands have started moving on the table. Tiny little lurches, the fingers tapping each other once, twice.

“They found a hair,” I say.

He stops moving. Then he shakes his head once and quickly, pats his pockets. Brings out his Rothmans and shakes the pack: there's only about five left. “Do us a favour, hand us one of those glasses over there, would you?”

On the lounge bar are stacks of pint and half-pint glasses that Brian hasn't bothered to shelve yet. Behind the stacks is a dark bar, deep shadows that could hide anything.

Maybe this is it.

“You need to stop,” I say, not moving.

“Excuse me?”

“Having me followed.”

“I didn't.”

“Someone saw me? Talking to my contact?”

“No. You said you were going to do it.” Tiernan has a cigarette in his mouth, a lighter in his hand and he nods towards the glasses. “Not supposed to smoke in here. Fuckin' law says so, but then the fuckin' law says this place isn't supposed to be open right now.”

I move painfully over to the bar. Stop when I'm at arm's length and grab a half-pinter.

Nothing happens. There's no one behind the bar.

“Callum,” says Tiernan.

I turn. He moves his chin.

“The glass?” he says.

Look down and I'm still holding the half-pint glass. I put it down on the table in front of him, and he lights his Rothmans.

The first drag makes his voice thick: “You said they found a hair.”

“A long hair,” I say, moving away from the lounge bar. “Female.”

His eyes flicker narrow for a second. “Female.”

“Just an assumption. Could be male.”

“How long?”

“I don't know. Shoulder?”

Tiernan visibly retreats into himself for a moment, blowing a long, steady stream of smoke into the air. I stand there, too tense to move, wondering if that'll be enough for him right now. Looks like he's on the right track with it when he asks, “He have a girlfriend?”

“Only one. That I know of.”

He looks up at me. Shakes his head, but it's a warning. “No.”

“You asked.”

And as it turns out, the hair
does
belong to Alison, but I'm not going to push that. Not yet. Still, it might be worth sowing a few more seeds.

“I have to tell you … when I'm
sure
. At the moment … Alison—”

“She's not involved.”

“I know. She told me.”

Tiernan shows his teeth, then moves his attention back to his cigarette. Appears to smoke half of it in one draw. “When did you see her?”

“Yesterday.”

“What for?”

“Needed to check … see if she'd seen Mo.” I wipe my nose and sniff. “Had to check …
everyone
. Didn't I?”

I let that hang in the air between us for a minute or so.

“Was I wrong?”

“She doesn't have anything to do with this.”

“You sure?”

There's an angry glint in his eyes when he looks at me again. “I'm fuckin' positive. Don't push this.”

An after-growl in his voice, like the roll of thunder after a flash of lightning.

“She said she … hadn't seen him. So it doesn't matter.”

“You should've told us you were going to see her.”

“I didn't know I needed …
permission
.”

He moves in his chair suddenly. A split-second, and he's a scrapyard dog on the end of a short, thin chain. I flinch.

“Sorry,” I say.

He seems to settle a bit, repeats himself in a tired voice: “She doesn't have anything to do with this.” He runs a hand briefly over his eyes, as if the glare in here is too much for him. “She couldn't have. She's working. Did she tell you that?”

“No.”

“She's working. Not much, like. I mean, her age, there's not a lot out there. Working at a stylists in Oldham. My day, they were called barbers, but not anymore, right? Don't think they even cut the hair anymore. Not much money, but I help her out, whatever she needs for the kid.” He makes a show of clearing his throat, then swallows whatever he's brought up, takes another drag off the Rothmans. “She doesn't come into Manchester. That's the deal. She works in Oldham, she lives in Oldham. Whenever she needs something, I go out to see her.”

I nod at him. “Okay.”

“So she wouldn't come to Manchester for anything anyway. Least of all to kill Mo.” He pulls a quick, disgusted face, and plants the cigarette in his mouth. “Not without telling us. She wouldn't do it. So there's no point in telling her about …” He looks up at me, staring hard. “She know about him?”

“Yes.”

“You told her?”

I pause for the count of three, as if I'm trying to remember. “Don't think so.”

“What's that mean?”

“She already … seemed to know.”

Tiernan returns his gaze to the pub table. Removes the cigarette and replaces it with his thumbnail, which he nibbles absently. “Right.”

“Someone must've … told her.”

“Yeah. That's what happened.”

The room falls into silence, apart from the slight, quiet click of Tiernan's thumbnail against his teeth.

Then he stops. Looks at the cigarette that's almost burned down to his fingers, and disposes of it in the glass.

“Anything else for me?”

“Not yet. When I find out … you find out.”

“You have my number.”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

He nods, sucks his teeth. “Okay. Then you can go. Keep me up-to-date.”

I head for the door.

“Do yourself a favour, Callum,” he says as I reach the exit to the lounge bar.

I turn to look at him.”Yeah?”

“Leave Alison out of this.”

“And if she's … involved?”

“She won't be.”

“But if she is?”

He fixes me with a stone glare. Don't go any further with this.

“She isn't. And even if she is, according to the police, she isn't. You understand me? Something comes up in that vein, you come to me, I'll sort it.”

I smile with half my face and indulge him with a slow nod, one hand on the doors to the hall. “You can trust me.”

“Yeah,” he says. “I better.”

DONKIN

Crack of dawn, I was out and about. I had the scraps of a hangover, but I didn't drink that much the night before to put us in a slow mood. A coffee and a sausage and bacon from the dirty van in Levenshulme, and I was ready to get to work.

I couldn't do anything about Paddy Reece, so I just had to fucking suck it up, hope it all went for the best. Maybe if I got a head start on this Tiernan thing, got that wrapped up all nice, I could use it as a cudgel when it came to Kennedy thumbing his fucking nose at us. Either way, when I got the bastard in cuffs after that Scouse twat already jacked in the case, it would look good for me. And I had come to the understanding that anything that made us look good would have to off-set that six-storey pile of shit that was looming over us right now.

The only way for us to get in there, though, was to verify what Innes was telling us the other night. When he was talking, I reckoned I played it off alright, acted like I knew what I was supposed to be doing, knew about any scene evidence that he brought up. But the problem was, if it ever came to an arrest, I knew I'd need more proof than the word of a mong jailbird.

Which was why I was in Levenshulme nice and early, and hammering on the door of a bloke called Mickey Watts. About five years ago, the bastard was mixed up with some of the nastiest fuckers in Manchester. He'd always been a bottomfeeder, nothing worth getting too het up over, and mostly forgotten by the dangerous people. But he was still paddling in the same pool, privy to some of the same information. So he was close to being the perfect grass.

Especially now he was straight, working the night shifts down the local Aldi.

Banging on his door now, I reckoned the fucker should still be up. It was early enough, and I remembered when I worked nights, the last thing I wanted to do when I got in was sleep. Normally stayed up for a couple hours drinking, just so's I
could
sleep.

I heard some thumping from behind his front door, and then his mug close to the frosted glass, giving us the eye. He must've seen the suit, not recognised us, because he opened up and pulled a face like he was expecting someone important. Mickey wore an old Sabbath T-shirt, boxer shorts that were hanging a little bit too open in front, and three days' worth of stubble on his face, surrounded by a wiry shock of metaller hair.

First thing out of his mouth was, “Shit.”

Might as well have been “good morning” the amount of time people greeted us like that. I grinned at him. “Need a word with you.”

“I just got in.”

“You work in your skivvies, then?”

“You know what I mean.”

I waved him back inside, stepped into the hallway. As I was closing the door behind us, blocking out all the light that came into this place, I said, “Won't take a minute, I promise.”

He was already heading up towards the kitchen. “You'll want a brew.”

“Wouldn't say no.”

Thing was with me and Mickey, there'd never been any real aggro between us. Like I said, he was a bottomfeeder and as such, he never really gave a fuck for the people he helped put in the jail, just as long as he wasn't fingered as a grass. All Mickey Watts really cared about was that expensive stereo system I caught a glimpse of as I was walking up the hall to the kitchen. He loved his music, did our Mickey. Fucking right headbanger he was an' all. That Sabbath T-shirt was a rare nod to the fucking mainstream for Mickey. Norwegian death metal, speed and thrash from places I couldn't point on a map. The bloke was only a couple years younger than me, made us feel like his dad.

Mickey put his back to the kitchen counter, pointed at the table and chairs. “You still milk and four?”

“Three.”

“Cutting down.”

I patted my gut. “Yeah.”

“So what is it, Detective? Who's pissed you off today?”

“No one.”

The kettle bubbled behind him. Mickey grabbed two mugs, dropped tea bags into each. “Aye, right. You want information on someone so's you can fuck them over.”

“Just need to ask 'em a few questions,” I said, sitting at the table. I held out my baccy tin. Mickey shook his head. I rolled a cigarette. “Need to talk to one of Mo Tiernan's lads.”

“Why?”

“None of your fuckin' business.”

He poured water on the tea bags, went to his fridge. “Just wondering. Because what I heard was that Mo was out of the game, and so were his boys.”

“Yeah?”

“Nobody's seen Mo for a while.”

“What about his lads? Which ones do you know are straight?”

Mickey dumped tea bags, started shovelling sugar into my brew. “Don't know anything about Baz, but I think Kevin Ross is working out at the Trafford Centre.”

“Doing what?”

“Currys. Selling tellies for a living.”

“Right, get us the Yellow Pages, then.”

Mickey stopped making the brews, shook his head at us, then trudged through into the hall. Came back and dumped the Yellow Pages on the kitchen table. I blew smoke and pulled it open. Looked for Currys' number. When I found it, I pulled out my mobile. Rang for ages before someone picked up. Nice and lazy did it.

“That Currys?” I said.

“Yeah.”

“You got a Kevin Ross working there?”

“Who's calling, please?”

“Just answer the fuckin' question.”

There was a cough, and I could tell whoever this arsehole was on the line, he was wondering who the fuck I was, and whether he should hang up. My guess was Rossie worked in a place where they had an idea of his past, which was why this conversation was still taking place. Nobody wanted to be the one to hang up on the bloke who'd come round and take their fucking kneecaps.

Then again, nobody wanted to be the bloke who grassed out a colleague.

Rossie couldn't have been employee of the month, though, because this bloke said, “Yeah, he works here.”

“He in today?”

“You want to speak to him?”

“In person. Who're you?”

Another pause. Wondering if he should give a false name.

“Don't fuckin' lie to us, son.”

“Kyle,” he said.

“Kyle? That your real name?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I'm the manager.”

“Good.”

And I hung up. Mickey put a brew down on the table next to us. I looked up at him. Slammed the Yellow Pages closed and flicked ash into the brew he made us. “No time for that, Mickey. Ta, anyway.”

“Don't know why I fuckin' bother,” he said.

I stood up and patted him on the cheek. When I did, more ash fell off my ciggie onto the table. “Because you fuckin' love us, you old tart.”

“You know how much milk costs?”

I stuck my cigarette back in my gob, reached into my jacket. Wasn't usual, but I pulled out my wallet, chucked him a twenty, squinted against the smoke. “Any more than that?”

“You never paid us before.”

I tweaked the ciggie from my mouth again, prodded the twenty. “Times are changing, Mickey. Can't go around being a hardarse my whole life. Better I pay you lads every now and then, compensation for putting you out if the information's any good.”

He was smiling at us, his eyebrows high. “And if it isn't?”

I was already halfway down the hall. “If it isn't, Mickey old son, I'll come back and I'll beat seven shades of shite out of you.”

That got him nodding. Some things never changed. But I did want to treat my grasses better if I could, maybe get the rep for being a fair copper. It was a new leaf, and probably only turned because I was in a good mood.

We'd see what Rossie had to say for himself. Because the thing about good moods was they had a habit of changing if someone started playing the cunt.