Sergeant Moore shook his head. ‘We’re at the end of a branch of a branch of a spur of another branch. Every time we get a proper storm, lightning hits the wires and blows our poor creaky wee exchange.’
Roberta thumped the handset back into its cradle. ‘Cock.’
‘Be lucky if they’ve got it fixed by this time next month.’
Every single sodding thing had to go wrong, didn’t it?
She marched off a couple of paces, turned and marched back again. ‘OK, so we can’t call for backup or Scene Examiners... What about driving to the nearest station and rounding up all the local bunnets?’
‘There’s only me and Mikey covering an area the size ofLuxembourg. Well, maybe notLuxembourg, but definitely two or three Liechtensteins.’
She stared at him.
A shrug. ‘Went there on holiday last year.’
‘Did your mum drop you on your...’
There was a weird metallic,‘ping, ping, ping,’noise and the lobby lights flickered on again. Tweedy the gamekeeper must’ve got the backup generator working.
Couldn’t help grinning at that. ‘Ya wee beauty!’
Sergeant Moore nodded. ‘You thinking what I’m thinking?’
‘Oh, yes.’
Even with the lights on, the hotel kitchen was a gloomy wee hole. The kind of place where they clearly didn’t believe in windows, opting for lots of stainless steel instead, with dark-red tiles on the floor. A bit like being stuck in a robot’s rectum.
Roberta curled forward over a countertop, resting her cheek against the cool metal while the kettle rattled to a boil.
Sergeant Moore placed two mugs in front of the kettle and followed them up with a jar of instant coffee. ‘For the record, this isnotwhat I was thinking.’
She squinted at him. ‘And would it kill you to knock up a bacon roll? Starving here...’
‘We need to talk about something.’
‘Wonder if there’s any leftovers in the fridge?’ Roberta scuffed over to the walk-in refrigerator, set into the back wall, by a big rack of pots and pans. Clunked open the door.
A rush of cool air slumped out to meet her, wrapping its chilly arms around her body, setting a wave of goose bumps rippling along her bare arms. Lovely.
Inside, the fridge was full of metal racks, all stacked high with boxes of vegetables and meat and whatnot. She stepped inside and the internal fan kicked in, whirring away as she stalked her way along the lines of shelving. Breath misting around her head, like a lungful of vape.
Out in the kitchen, Sergeant Moore’s voice took on a ‘breaking bad news’ kind of tone, doing its best to sound tactful as it wafted into the fridge.‘Our victim, Sir Reginald, father-of-the-bride...’
‘What about him?’
‘You assaulted him last night.’
Oh...
‘I didn’t “assault” him, we had a fair and frank exchange of views, that’s all.’ A bunch of industrial-strength Tupperware boxes took up the shelving rack at the end of the fridge. She grabbed one at random and creaked off the lid. Leftover roast potatoes. Not bad.
‘Only, you know, that puts you on the list of suspects.’
‘Suspects smushpects.’ She creaked the lid off another box: carrots and peas, all mixed together like a DIY vomit kit. ‘Urgh.’ The lid went on again and the Tupperware got stuffed back where it came from. ‘Scotland would be a better place if more people gave the landed gentry a damn hard slap every now and then.’
Next box: roast beef – still nice and pink. Result.
Roberta grabbed it. ‘And he fondled my wife’s arse. What wouldyoudo?’
