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preamble, listening to Logan's account of the desecration of David Reid's body in the exact same way he'd listened to the search team progress reports.
    Silent. Impassive. Stuffing his face. He finished off the cola bottles and brought out a packet of wine gums.
    'Wonderful,' he said when Logan had finished. 'So we've got a paedophile serial kil er running around Aberdeen.'
    'Not necessarily,' said Watson, accepting a little orange lozenge with 'Sherry' embossed on the top. 'There's only one body, not a series, and the kil er may not even be local...'
    Insch merely shook his head.
    Logan took a 'Port'.'The body lay undisturbed for three months. The kil er even went back, long after rigor mortis had set in, and took a souvenir. He had to know his hiding place was safe. That screams "local". The fact that he came back and took a bit of the body means this is something special to him. Your man's not done this on a whim: he's been thinking about it for a long time. This is some sort of ritual fantasy he's acting out. He's going to do it again. If he hasn't already.'
    Insch agreed. 'I want al missing child reports for the last year pul ed. Get the list up on the wal over there. Chances are some of them may have crossed this sick bastard's path.'
    'Yes, sir.'
    'Oh and, Logan,' said the DI, careful y folding the wine gum packet shut and stuffing it back in his pocket. 'I had a cal from the Journal. They tel me you've been up there leaning on their new golden boy.'
    Logan nodded. 'Colin Mil er: used to work on the Scottish Sun. He's the one that--'
    'Did I ask you to go antagonizing the newspapers, Sergeant?'
    Logan's mouth snapped shut. Pause. 'No, sir. We were in the neighbourhood and I thought--'
    'Sergeant,' said DI Insch, slowly and deliberately. 'I'm glad you're thinking. That's a good sign. Something I encourage in my officers.' There was a big 'but' coming: Logan could feel it.
    'But I don't expect them to go off and annoy the local press without permission. We're going to have to put out appeals to the public. We're going to have to do damage limitation if someone screws something up in the investigation. We're going to need these people on our side.'
    'This morning you said--'
    'This morning I said I'd nail whoever spoke to the press. And I wil . This is our screw-up, not the paper's. Understand?'
    He'd screwed up. WPC Watson suddenly took a great deal of interest in her shoes as Logan said, 'Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.'
    'OK.' Insch picked a sheet of paper off the desk and handed it to a suitably chastised Detective Sergeant McRae. 'The search teams haven't found a thing. Surprise, surprise. There's an underwater search unit doing the river, but the rain's made it almost impossible. The damn thing's already broken its banks in about a mil ion places. We're lucky the body was found at al .
    Another couple of days and the river would've swamped the ditch and whoosh...' He swept his hand past, the fingertips sparkling with little grains of sugar from the cola bottles. 'David Reid's body would've been washed right out into the North Sea. Next stop Norway. We'd never have found it.'
    Logan tapped the post mortem report against his teeth, his eyes focused on a spot just above DI Insch's bald head. 'Maybe it's too much of a coincidence?' he said, frowning. 'David Reid's been lying there for three months, but if no one finds him before the river bursts its banks, he's never going to be found.' His eyes drifted back to the inspector. 'He gets swept out to sea and the story never hits the papers. No publicity. The kil er can't read about his achievements. There's no feedback.'
    Insch nodded. 'Good thinking. Get someone to drag the finder...' He checked his notes.
    'Mr Duncan Nicholson. Get him in here and give him a proper gril ing, not the half-arsed one he got last night. If the man's got any skeletons in his closet I want to know about them.'
    'I'l get an area car to--' was as far as Logan got before the door to the incident room burst