Logan nodded at the wall of photos, above the till. ‘Andrew Shaw works here.’
‘Andy?’ Brenda let go of Steel’s mane and grabbed her shoulders instead. Steering her towards a seat. ‘Well,sort of. He hires a chair. Not been in today, though. Or yesterday, come to that. But it’s his money he’s wasting, right?’ She plonked Steel down and froofed her hair some more. ‘Have you ever thought of a bit of colour? I mean, you’rerockingthe grey, but auburn would be nice with your complexion. Ooooooh: or a nice rich chestnut!’
Logan tried again. ‘Do you have a list of his clients?’
‘Hold on.’ Looking over her shoulder. ‘EMMA? EMMA SWEETIE, CAN YOU HELP THESE GENTLEMEN WHILE I GLAM UP THIS NICE LADY?’
A young woman emerged from a door at the back of the shop, with blonde hair down to the middle of her back and a wad of chewing gum on the go. All dressed up in pink and black.
Brenda clapped both hands down on Steel’s shoulders. ‘Now: how do you feel about a curly pixie with shaved sides?’
‘Ermm...’ Looking abitlike a hedgehog caught in the headlights of an oncoming truck.
Emma slouched up to Logan and Tufty. Gave their haircuts a quick once-over, then rolled her eyes. ‘Yup?’ Sounding as bored as she looked.
‘Hi.’ Logan tried a friendly smile. ‘We need to see your appointments book, going back about eight wee—’
‘Six months would begreat.’ Tufty tilted his head on one side. ‘Your hair isamazing, by the way. It’s like molten gold!’
‘Oh.’ And she locked right in, giving the wee loon a little hair flip and a giggle. ‘Whythank you. You’re so sweet.’ Emma slipped her arm into Tufty’s. ‘You come with me, and we’ll get you logged on to the computer.’
Logan did a slow three-sixty. ‘Don’t suppose you’ve got CCTV, do you?’
She pointed with her free hand, lowering her voice to a whisper, even though there was no one else here. ‘Cameras are fake.’ Then squeezed Tufty’s arm. ‘Would you like a coffee?’ And led him away, back through the door she’d emerged from.
Didn’t sodding askLoganif he wanted a coffee though, did she. Just snuck off with the wee loon.
Because women were essentially weird.
Meaning Logan had been abandoned, all alone, in the middle of the salon.
Pfff...
He wandered over to the coffee table and had a squint at the newspapers. TheAberdeen Examinerblared out its completely unfair ‘POLICEFUMBLEINVESTIGATIONASWORLDPRESSLOOKSON’ nonsense, but because they’d scooped everyone on the Natasha Agapova story, none of the other publications were covering it. Yet. Instead, most of the tabloids hawked some variant of ‘SOAP STAR SIGOURNEY’S COCAINE SHAME’, except for theScottish Daily Postwhich screamed ‘ILLEGAL MIGRANTS ROBBING OAP GRAVES’. Because when racists were lobbing Molotov cocktails, why not give them tokens for free petrol?
Bunch of bastards.
Logan abandoned the papers and went for a frown outthrough the shop windows at Chapel Street’s various comings and goings instead. Which wasn’t exactly thrilling.
Worse yet, the shop looked straight into the dining room of the hotel opposite, where a bunch of people were tucking into lunch.
His stomach snarled, like a wee gurgly wolf.
Well, it wasn’t as if he wasdoinganything right now.
Might as well make use of this time to achieve something...
Logan emerged from the Chapel Bakery –EST. 1954 – the proud owner of a takeaway coffee and two wee paper bags, promisingly spotted with grease.
Soon as his foot hit pavement he opened one of the bags, shoogling the pie inside upwards, until half of it poked out. Took a bite of mince-and-mealie. Whoopha-whoompha-whoomphing his breath around the blisteringly hot, but delicious mouthful.
Then scuffed his way down the street, munching away, trying not to burn his mouth as the sun battered down from its dusty blue sky.
Probably should’ve put on sunscreen this morning, because the skin on his cheeks was already starting to tighten.
When he got to the pool car, Logan popped his coffee on the roof and went to do the same with his other paper bag. But some sort of evil seagull radar must’ve tipped off Landfill and Mixed-Recycling to its contents, because the pair of them stopped screaming at each other and glared across the road with envious eyes.
Well, they could sodrightoff.
