Logan sighed. “I have no idea. This whole case, it feels… Off. We’re bouncing around all over the place, following a trail that might well lead us nowhere. I feel like we’re missing something.”

“Aye, well, I had a wee thought while I was standing in that swing park with all those lads behind us,” Tyler said. “I thought, if these bastards slit our throats and dump our bodies somewhere, will anyone ever find us?”

“Jesus Christ, son, you went from nought to sixty there.”

“Maybe got a bit carried away, right enough. I was starting to panic, if I’m honest. But the point is, it got me thinking about how someone might be able to track us down and find our bodies,” Tyler said. “And that gave me an idea…”

Chapter Thirty-Four

Twenty minutes later, Logan and Tyler had checked in at a Premier Inn that sat tantalisingly across the Clyde from the plusher hotel they’d been in the night before, then headed up to their rooms. They were both on the same floor, and Logan stopped outside Tyler’s room for a minute or two, purportedly to discuss dinner plans for the evening, but mostly to make sure the DC was holding up OK.

“I think I’m just going to get an early night, boss,” Tyler said, and there was a note of defeat underscoring the words. “I’ll give Sinead a ring, then get sorted for the early train in the morning.”

Logan agreed that was probably for the best. They exchanged something that was partway between a handshake and a hug, but neither one thing nor the other, then the DCI continued to his own room, dumped his bag inside, then had a thoroughly enjoyable piss that had been building since lunchtime.

That done, he made a phone call. It was short, but about as far from sweet as it was possible to be. It did the job, though, and a key element of a half-formed plan fell into place.

He was heading back down to get himself a bite to eat when the phone had started ringing in his pocket. There were two other people in the lift with him, and when he saw Ben’s name flash up on the screen he decided to let it ring until they all stepped out at the ground floor, and he could take the call somewhere more private.

He stepped outside, strode past the huddled grey knot of smokers, and answered with one ring to spare before his answerphone would’ve kicked in.

“What’s the latest?” he asked, his rumbling stomach urging him to skip all the usual niceties.

He jammed a finger in his ear, blocking out the sound of the wind as it gusted along the Clyde and whistled through the gaps of Bell’s Bridge. A tumble of words came rushing down the line from a hundred miles north.