‘No, I’m not saying that. You know I’m not. You’re a better cop than any of them and that’s all the more reason not to give them any room to slag you off. It’s not just about them either. I’ve a duty to manage resources and having half the MIT team sitting scratching their balls while you take on every case in the book isn’t the best way to do that.’

‘Leaving me in charge of the case is the best way to do it. We’ve got a probable name for the victim and if dental records match then I’m going to inform the husband.’

‘No.’

‘I’ve talked to the guy in charge at Saturn and there’s no doubt he’s dodgy. I’ve got Johnny Jackson all over the company history and it stinks. Saturn is a phoenix firm with a history of unexplained fires and they’re tied at the hip with the Mullens. I’m on this.’

‘No!’ He was shouting now too. ‘The Mullens? Are you trying to give me reasons to take you off this? If they are involved in any way then we’ll need to liaise with Organized Crime. You’re not getting all of that. Storey and Rico can pick it all up quickly enough. We need—’

‘This is out of order.’

‘Don’t push it, Rachel. I’ve made my decision. And unless you can give me a very good reason not to do this—’

She blurted it out before she could think it through. ‘I think the cases are linked.’

There was a bemused pause before he laughed in her face. ‘What? They’re linked. And you’ve just worked this out now?’

‘No, it’s a connection I’ve been looking at. I think it’s got legs and it makes sense for me to pursue both.’

‘This will be good. Go on.’

She breathed deeply, clutched at a straw, said a silent prayer to Danny Neilson and hoped for the best. ‘I think both cases are linked to urbexing.’

His face screwed up as if she’d spoken in Swahili. ‘Urbexing? I knew this would be good. What the hell is that?’

‘It’s a hobby. A pursuit, I guess. Short for urban exploration. People go into abandoned buildings and the like. Places they’re not supposed to go. Places like—’

‘Like the Molendinar Burn? Really?’

‘Yes. And places like the old Odeon. Both are known sites for urbexers. The people who do this kind of thing.’

Addison scratched his head and was clearly regretting the entire conversation. ‘People who break into places. They’ve got a fancy name now, have they? In my day we called them thieves.’

‘They don’t steal things. That’s not the point.’

‘So what is the point?’

‘The real point is that I think the cases could be linked. Yes, it might be speculation. Yes, it might come to nothing. But it’s worth a look. And for that reason you should keep me on both.’

He stared at her for a while, long enough for her to see the wheels turning in his head. He was almost there but she saw him pull back.

‘No. This is nonsense. You can’t just pluck this stuff out of thin air.’

‘I’ve already got Becca Maxwell checking it out. It’s not like I’ve just made it up. What do you take me for?’

She hoped he wouldn’t answer that. She had got Maxwell to check it out after the Odeon find but with no real expectation that there was anything in it. She still didn’t believe it but right then it was all she had.

‘Rachel, I’ve made my mind up.’

‘Give me a bit more time.’

‘No.’

‘Give me till the end of the day.’

He groaned. ‘You really think there might be something in this?

‘Yes.’

‘You’ll be the fucking death of me. Okay, end of the day and that’s it. Understand?’

‘Got it.’ All she had done was buy herself some time but it was something.

‘Okay, now tell me about the case you will be working. Tell me where we are with the Molendinar guy.’

She breathed for what seemed like the first time in five minutes. ‘Well it turns out that although he’d been staying at the Rosewood when he was killed, he wasn’t homeless.’

‘So what the hell was he doing there?’

‘I spoke to the boss at the City Mission, made a few phone calls and got a facial reconstruction done. This guy had been asking a lot of questions, both at the Rosewood and the Mission. He was a journalist named Euan Hepburn, working undercover. Tony knew him and confirmed the facial ID.’

‘Tony? And when did you two discuss this?’

She ignored the tease in his voice, pretended to herself that he couldn’t be insinuating anything. ‘He was there when the reconstruction came through from Dundee. Anyway, I made a few calls this morning and none of the Scottish news desks claim to have commissioned him to do it. He was a freelance so he might have been getting the story first, then intending to flog it to the highest bidder. A couple of the papers confirmed they’d taken stories from him before and they had an address for him for payment. A flat in Cordiner Street in Mount Florida.’

‘A journalist. Great. Just great. I take it you haven’t released his name to the press.’

‘No. I was planning to hold on to that for a while longer. For one thing, we need to contact his sister, the next of kin. We’ll run a DNA test on her for confirmation. Anyway, it will do us no harm to keep his identity to ourselves for a bit.’

‘Agreed. You checked his flat out?’

‘Not yet. I’ve sent Toshney and a couple of uniforms over. We’ll see what they come back with. But if he was undercover then it gives us a motive to play with.’

‘The owners of the hotel?’

‘Yes. If he was digging the dirt on the place, stands to reason that someone wouldn’t be too happy about that.’

‘Who owns it?’

‘Two businessmen. Thomas Kilgannon and Brian Wells. Neither of them has a record. Although they should have just for running that place. It should have been shut down years ago. If they found out Hepburn was undercover and they had something to hide then they’d need to shut him up.’

Addison levelled her with a stare. ‘Okay. And how exactly does that fit in with your urbexing theory?’

Good point, sir, she thought.

‘I don’t know yet,’ she said.

Addison shook his head. ‘I’m regretting this already. Okay, let’s not get carried away with this pair either. Wanting them to be guilty isn’t enough to bring a case against them.’

She sighed heavily. ‘Look, I’m not wishing them guilty. Okay, maybe I am a bit. Have you been in that place? It is criminal the way those people are living. They are being milked of their housing benefit and left to die slowly from drink and drugs. I’m betting the owners make a small fortune from keeping those poor bastards in that shithole and people will do whatever it takes to keep the money rolling in. One thing we can be sure of, the people who own the Rosewood aren’t big on scruples.’

Addison spread his arms wide in surrender. ‘Okay, okay. Get down from your soapbox and go bring them in.’ He looked at his watch. ‘I’m free later this afternoon. Haul them in and I’ll sit in with you. Okay?’

She agreed grudgingly. ‘Okay. And it’s not a soapbox.’

‘High horse?’

‘Common decency.’ She was laughing. ‘You should try it sometime.’

‘That would involve principles, Rachel. I’ve got no time for principles. I’m a police officer. And remember, end of the day is all you’ve got for this urbexing thing, then it’s gone.’

Chapter 21

It took seven hours to get Thomas Kilgannon and Brian Wells into an interview room. Narey’s case to drag them into Stewart Street was weak and no one knew that better than their lawyer. Arthur Constance finally relented and said that his clients would agree to visit the officers out of a sense of civic duty and a willingness to help if they could.