Free Dead Girl Walking by Christopher Brookmyre

replied, poker-faced.
    Damien knew something was up, and was curious as to what Parlabane might know, but couldn’t probe for fear of giving anything away.
    Parlabane had been looking for a weak spot in the façade Damien was shoring up, and he was pretty sure he’d just found it.
    ‘You used to be in Discolite, didn’t you?’ Parlabane asked, pretending this had spontaneously occurred to him.
    Damien nodded.
    ‘The whole time in there, I was trying to work out why I knew your face. I saw you guys play the Kelvin University Union.’
    The guitarist couldn’t help but smile.
    ‘We were practically the house band for a while. Never quite found an audience beyond Glasgow, unfortunately. It might well have been our final gig that you saw.’
    ‘Well, I liked you, for what it’s worth.’
    Damien’s gaze remained intent, perhaps asking himself what a guy Parlabane’s age had been doing at the student union back then, and coming upon a genuine recognition of his own.
    ‘Hang on, you were … We played the inauguration ball – were you not the rector or something?’
    ‘In another life. And I only won the election by default. I’m nobody’s idea of a figurehead.’
    ‘You were an investigative reporter, though, were you not? As opposed to a music journalist.’
    He said it with just an edge of accusation. That’s right, pal: follow the breadcrumbs.
    ‘I go where the work is,’ Parlabane replied, choosing his words with precise ambiguity.
    Damien reflected on this, then glanced towards the rehearsal suite.
    ‘How do you know Mairi?’
    ‘We go way back. Known her since my teens.’
    Damien nodded, getting the picture.
    Parlabane knew he could take a risk here. This was the experienced head Mairi described as the glue that held the band together, but Parlabane also recognised that Damien was the one he could most trust to keep quiet about his suspicions. This band was the ship Damien must have thought had long since sailed without him, so he was going to do nothing that would take her into choppy waters.
    ‘Mairi’s having trouble getting hold of Heike,’ Parlabane said, dropping his voice a fraction. ‘She’s starting to get a wee bit worried, just between you and me.’
    Damien’s silence said plenty, his lack of surprise blethering unguardedly too.
    ‘When did you last speak to her? Berlin maybe?’
    Still he said nothing, and still his silence spoke volumes.
    ‘I’m wondering if there was something on her mind. New album due out, this huge US tour coming up … That’s a lot of pressure. How did she seem when you last saw her?’
    ‘She was fine. Normal.’
    Parlabane nodded, like he understood.
    ‘You know, loyalty isn’t always what you think,’ he said. ‘Telling me the truth doesn’t make you a grass.’
    Damien’s cheeks flushed a little as he weighed this up. They both knew he was lying now; all that remained was whether he would keep up the charade.
    ‘She was pretty withdrawn,’ he admitted.
    ‘In Berlin?’
    ‘Before that. After Rostock. I’ve never seen her like it: so distant, her mind somewhere else – away from the music, I mean. Normally, no matter what else is going down, Heike’s still a pro. I’ve never seen her so disengaged. I put it down to running out of steam towards the end of the tour. Things were pretty fraught after the photos.’
    ‘I can imagine.’
    ‘I tried to engineer a bit of a clear-the-air tête-à-tête between the girls in Rostock, but I guess it backfired. Heike was dealing with it better than Monica at that point, which is what you’d expect, but after that it was the other way around.’
    ‘It seems disproportionate from the outside, but I suppose when you’re on tour and living on top of each other, you can start to feel besieged.’
    Parlabane was trying to seem sympathetic, but really he was fishing. He just wanted to keep the conversation going, to see where Damien might take it. He was looking for what he called a satellite: a