The Dead Beat Read Online Free PDF Page B

notebook and pencil out. Very old school. Didn’t they have iPads now? She wondered if they got taught during training a certain way to take police notes, like she studied shorthand.
    She explained about Gordon crying down the phone, revealing who he was, then the sound of a gun. She explained about Billy getting the address and the two of them going round.
    ‘And where is this Billy Blackmore?’ the cop said.
    She looked around. Good question.
    ‘He went to get coffee.’
    But that was ages ago. Maybe he left the hospital, left her to deal with all this herself. Lovely.
    She described what they’d found in Noble Place, screwing up her face at the gory details. He jotted it all down diligently. She gave her number and address, in case they needed to contact her again.
    ‘Why would you need to get in touch again?’ Martha said.
    ‘We won’t, it’s just standard procedure. But this seems a simple attempted suicide. The only interesting thing is where he got a gun.’
    The only interesting thing. Something occurred to Martha.
    ‘Where is the gun?’
    She couldn’t remember seeing it after the paramedics arrived.
    The cop’s radio crackled.
    ‘There are other officers at the scene,’ he said. ‘And forensics. They’ll take care of that.’
    ‘You got the grieving widow shift, yeah?’
    The cop frowned. ‘She’s not a widow, miss. At least, not yet.’
    ‘Sorry.’
    Why did she let her mouth run away with her sometimes?
    The double doors to surgery opened and the slutty nurse came through with Dr Khan from earlier. Samantha bolted out of her chair, shredded tissue clutched in her hands. Martha got up too and walked over, she wanted to hear this.
    ‘Mrs Harris?’ Khan said. He was tiny, the shortest person in the room, with delicate bones and a high voice.
    She nodded and sniffed.
    ‘Your husband is alive, but in a coma,’ he said. ‘His condition is very serious, I’m afraid. We stabilised and cleaned up his wounds as best we could, but there has been significant trauma to the face and brain. He’ll be taken to ICU and monitored. We won’t know about his brain function or vital signs for a while. It’s a waiting game now. I’m sorry it’s not better news.’
    ‘Can I see him?’
    Dr Khan was already trying to extricate himself from her, his body language screaming that he had to be somewhere else.
    ‘Of course, upstairs in intensive care.’ He nodded to the nurse. ‘Charlene can show you where that is.’
    The nurse looked put out, turning a sarcastic smile at the surgeon, but she took Samantha by the arm anyway.
    As soon as they were heading away, Dr Khan vanished back through the double doors. Martha’s cop got a call on his radio and indicated to his partner that they were heading too.
    ‘If we need anything else we’ll be in touch,’ he said as they clumped away.
    She was alone in the waiting room.
    Billy arrived round a corner with two coffees.
    ‘Good timing, you just missed the cops.’
    He looked sheepish. ‘I know, I was waiting for them to leave.’
    He handed a cup to her.
    ‘Why?’ she said.
    ‘I just have a thing about cops.’
    ‘That’s not a good enough answer.’
    ‘OK, cops have a thing about me.’
    ‘That still isn’t good enough.’
    ‘Let’s just say that I’m known to the police.’
    ‘You have a record?’
    ‘Not exactly.’
    ‘Let me guess, armed robbery and murder?’
    ‘I’ll tell you later.’
    She looked at him. ‘You are such a fucking tease.’
    Billy looked at the doors to surgery. ‘What did the doc say?’
    ‘Don’t change the subject, we were talking about your previous encounters with Lothian and Borders’ finest.’
    ‘No, we weren’t.’
    Something in his voice made her drop it.
    ‘Gordon is alive but in a coma. They don’t know if he’s going to come out of it.’
    ‘And where did Nurse Tarty-pants take his wife?’
    ‘Upstairs to intensive care.’
    Billy took a sip of his coffee, thinking. Martha did likewise. It tasted of