SUSAN TIPPETT BRAITHWAITE

Hiya!

Welcome to another Things in Scots. This week’s Scots word is chitterin. The snippet I’ve added is a bit longer than I normally add. But, if I’d kept it short, it would have lost a lot of the feel and flavour of the scene.

If you’ve been enjoying the audio companions, I hope you’ll enjoy my first foray into doing the whole video thing below.? (There may or may not be a whole lot of outtakes for some later date. ?)

Oh, yeah, it’s a wee bittie sweary and… intense.

Here’s the snippet… (unedited draft)

Adam slammed his phone onto the stainless steel worktop. “Shite.”

“What? Still no location on Blackwell?” Poppy asked.

“No. Go and gee Dani up a bit, eh?” He waited until Poppy left the massive kitchen and was well out of earshot before he spoke to Ward. “Who’s left?”

A knowing smile tugged at Ward’s mouth. “You are uniquely motivated. Maybe you can get him to talk where we couldn’t.” He yanked open the walk-in freezer door and dragged out a chitterin man in bloodied chef’s whites. He gripped his shoulders. “Now, I’ll give you one last chance to tell me where your boss is,” he sucked air through his teeth, “or I’m going to have to hand you over to him.” He inclined his head towards Adam. “A wee FYI for you, he’s not as gentle as me.”

Going by the cuts and bruises, the man had already experienced Ward’s brand of coaxing. “I don’t know anything. I’m just the help.”

No one in Blackwell’s organisation was ‘just the help’. They were all equally guilty, all equally deadly. All except Elle, and he’d been the one to force her into this. An eerie calm settled on Adam’s shoulders. He would make him talk. He’d do it to find Elle. Even if it cost him his soul. “Have it your way.”

Ignoring his own injuries, Adam hauled the cuffed man to the deep butler sink and shoved his face onto the worktop next to it, forcing him to watch what was in store for him. The man’s eyes widened imperceptibly as Adam sunk the plug into the plughole and turned the tap on full. “Where’s Blackwell?”

The man struggled against Adam’s restraining hand as the water level rose. “I don’t know.”

Before the man could utter another lie, Adam curled a fist into his hair. He forced his head under the water, holding him there as the water pounded the man’s head from above.

The man struggled, bucking his body back. Adam shoved his forearm across the man’s back, holding him in place. The man jerked violently as his oxygen began to run out, sending water sloshing over the sides to the floor.

The man’s feet slid on the wet floor as he fought against Adam’s restraining arm. Panic wasn’t enough; it was too easy for an operative to lie in that state. Desperation was where truth lived.

“He’s had enough,” Ward said. “C’mon, man, he’s had enough.”

Adam let the man up. “Where is he?”

The man spluttered and coughed against the water that had almost killed him. “I don’t—“

Adam shoved him back under the water. “I. Don’t. Know. Isn’t acceptable,” he shouted loud enough to be heard under the pounding water.

A series of bubbles came from the man. Adam let him up.

“I don’t know!”

“Back under you go, then.”

The man struggled, kicking out at Adam.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Killian said as he stepped into the room.

“His job. Unless you’ve got a lead, this is it,” Ward said.

Killian bounded across the room. “We don’t do this shite. We’re not them. We’ll get Blackwell….” Guilt and pain filled his eyes.

Adam yanked the dripping man up. “If the next words out of your mouth are ‘I don’t know,’ I’m going to feed you a fucking bullet.”

Running the Asset (Deniable Unit #1)

So, how did you do? Were you able to figure out from the context of the snippet that chitterin means shivering from the cold? Hopefully, you did. Let me know in the comments how easy or difficult you found it to understand that’s what it meant.

That’s it for this week

I hope you enjoyed this post and the video if you watched it. I’d love to hear what you thought of the new format–do you prefer audio/text/video/a combo?

If you find yourself inspired by the Scots words I share, add the tag #TiS or #ThingsinScots to your writing/art/photo post and drop your link in the comments.

If you want to see more Scots posts, check out the original series, Things in Scots.

Thanks for reading. Take care, and I hope to see you next week for more Scots on Fiction Friday!