Read A Plague Of Crows: The Second Detective Thomas Hutton Thriller for Free Online

game,' says Taylor.
    'We always do.'
    'So we start by establishing if any police officers have gone missing in the last day or two, because the way he carried out that first murder, he must have grabbed the victims some time before they died. There had to be a gap.'
    'Were any of them reported missing?'
    Taylor stares at me for a second than shakes his head, drops his eyes.
    'He had that covered as well. None of them were missed.'
    'Why?'
    'A combination of things, and it all points to the fact that this was immaculately planned. Either they lived alone, or the ones who didn't had time off work previously planned. They had arranged to go away. It was… it was like he was inside their lives, knew what they were doing, knew that he could secret them away and nobody would notice. How do we counteract that?'
    'He was doing it online? Facebook, that kind of shit?'
    He stares at me again. 'You weren't paying attention at the briefing, were you?'
    Look a bit sheepish.
    'Fuck, Sergeant, head in the game. The next time you're in the same room as a bunch of women, stop trying to work out which one you want to sleep with.'
    Hide behind my drink. No one likes to get read like a damned book.
    'We're checking it out, but we've found nothing so far.'
    'So, realistically, we're not going to know if there are any officers missing?' I ask, to move the conversation on from Facebook.
    'No.'
    'What do we do about that, then?'
    He takes a long drink. Drags his hand across his face.
    'If it was just the one station, if we knew it was on our patch, we could introduce a system... I don't know, a checking-in system, a buddy system… But shit, we can't city-wide. And what do we know? Maybe it's country-wide. Maybe the next one'll be in the south of England. Or in France. This level of planning, how in the name of God are we supposed to know?'
    V&t to my lips. Getting near the end, and it's losing a little of its crispness. Clearly I'm going to need another one.
    'He knows,' I say.
    Taylor drains his pint and places it on the table. He looks into it as the last of the froth hugs the side of the glass and slides down.
    *
    Second night back at home. Already changed the sheets, did a bit of a tidy. Glad I did it yesterday, as I've already reverted to where I was four months ago. The weeks of clean living and communing with the Gods of the Scottish highlands have gone. I woke up yesterday morning at the foot of a mountain. This evening it feels like a hundred years ago.
    Brought a prostitute home with me. I know. Filthy. Picked her up in town. Had to drive on the back of four v&ts to go and find her. No hookers on the streets of Cambuslang and Rutherglen anymore.
    She wanted to do it in the car. I wanted her to come back to my place. She refused, which is quite right of course. These people are mental if they go home with anyone. Being a bit pissed, I showed her my badge. She still refused, but at least began to enter into negotiations. I paid through the nose in the end. She wouldn't come until I'd gone to a cash point and got several hundred. It's just sweetie money to me at the moment, because I've got four months wages in there that I've hardly spent.
    Back to my place. I made her shower first. Didn't ask how many she'd scored earlier in the evening, didn't want to know. I was gallant enough to shower too. After all that, it was worth it. Every penny. Great tongue on her, absolutely beautiful body, she had the decency to try to earn her money and got stuck into it. Great fun.
    A fair compensation for feeling like a complete and total loser for having to go to her in the first place.
    Called her a cab, then fell asleep as soon as she was gone. The door was locked and I knew she wouldn't be coming back.
    *
    Went to see Bob the next night. He didn't disappoint. Not that he ever does. He disappoints some people, of course. The nostalgia brigade, not the fans. The kind of people that go and watch Cliff Fucking Richard and McCartney, the Rolling Stones even.