‘Senior officers, you corrugated Fraggle. Anyone over the rank of sergeant?’
A wee fuzzy monster hopped up onto the end of the bed, big floofy tail pluming in the air as she padded along the sliver of duvet Tara hadn’t annexed yet. Cthulhu clambered onto Logan’s scar-scrambled stomach. Pausing to blink at him with lovely amber eyes. Before tiptoeing across his chest and headbutting his chin. Purring all the way.
‘Oh, I see...No. It’s like a haunted pirate ship here this morning. Arrrrrrr...Avast, me absent hearties!’
Cthulhu rubbed her cheek against Logan’s phone, claiming it as her own, then gnawed at his wrist to make him put down her property. And those cat teeth were sharp.
‘Ow! You little horror...’
Tufty’s voice drooped.‘Sorry, Sarge.’
‘No, not...’ Logan swapped his phone to the other hand – out of biting range – and ruffled the fluff between Cthulhu’s ears.
More purring.
Suppose there was no point pretending this would all go away: someone had to take charge.
He let a big sigh rattle free. ‘Better put her on: The Evil Empress Of Poopland.’
‘Thanks, Sarge.’There was a scrunching noise, and Tufty went all muffled.‘Sarge? It’s the sarge, for you.’
Steel groaned in the background.‘Oh aye? What’s that lazy buntfumper want now?’
‘He’s in bed.’
‘Give.’More scrunching, then Steel came through loud and sleazy.‘You having a breakfast knee-trembler, and need some advice how to satisfy Ginger McHotpants, there?’
‘Where’s DCI McCulloch?’
‘I generally find nibbling the inside of a thigh to be a good starting point, especially if—’
‘McCulloch: where is he?’
‘What am I, his mum?’ Something on her end wenthisssssss, thenwhooomph. Which probably meant she was puffing away on that stupid vape again.‘Got to say, it’s pretty unprofessional: skiving off Morning Prayers for whatever squelchy deviance you heterosexuals get up to of a morning. Some of us have been here for hours.’
Cthulhu jumped down from his chest and did a bit of cat yoga – showing everyone her bumhole in Downward Dog.
Logan swung his legs out of bed, then sat there, yawning. Ratcheting the heel of his free hand into one eye socket. ‘Get someone round Rutherford’s house and make sure he’s OK. Then I want everyone doing somethinguseful: search teams back out there; door-to-doors in Bridge of Don, Tillydrone and Hillhead; and someone needs to canvass every A-and-E and minor-injuries unit in the northeast. See if Charles MacGarioch’s turned up looking for treatment.’ He blinked at the bedside clock – 07:08 – then yawned again. ‘I’ll be there in fifteen.’
‘Yes, your Majesty, three bags full.’Hisssssss...whooomph. ‘Anything else? Want me to polish your bumhole while I’m at it?’
‘And no vaping in the office!’
He hung up and sagged for a moment.
Before hauling his naked, unpolished, arse out of bed.
Nearly half an hour later, Logan marched into the office, with a takeaway coffee in one hand and a rowie in the other.
Tufty had been right – itwaslike a ghost ship in here, only with fewer parrots and no rum. And more in the way of desks and cubicles and whiteboards and filing cabinets and office chairs. So maybe notquiteso piratey after all.
A small knot of support staff crewed the phones and HOLMES suite, but one of them sounded as if she was trying to expel a lung. But that was it as far as the dayshift was concerned. Everyone else was out.
Logan picked his way between the desks to the corner where DCI Rutherford and his team usually sat – the snotty heart of Operation Iowa.
No one there, of course.
He took a bite of rowie, chewing on salty-fatty-stodgygoodness as he picked through Rutherford’s in-box. Which seemed to be the usual depressing mix of memos and circulars and reports and—