“Aye. No. I don’t think so,” he said, once the hilarity had come to an end. “He might’ve been a headcase, but he wasn’t daft. Not after last time.”
Logan raised an eyebrow. “Last time? What do you mean?”
Dinky shrugged, a sly smile curving one corner of his mouth. “Let’s just say, he’s borrowed money off me a few times before, and that on one of those occasions he ‘forgot’ to pay it back on the agreed timetable.”
“What did you do?” Logan asked. He expected Dinky to act coy about it, and at most to give some vague hint of what had transpired without getting into the details.
Coy, however, did not seem to be in the man’s vocabulary.
“Let’s just say that during discussions, one of his wrists got broken,” he said, practically rubbing his hands together with glee.
“Are you confessing to a crime here, Dinky?”
Realisation darted across the other man’s face, and he gave a sad little shake of his head. “Of course not. It was an accident, obviously. Nothing for you lot to get involved in. Real shame. But, on the upside, we’ve had a long and successful business relationship since, with clarity and understanding on both sides. He was one of my best customers.”
He got down from the couch and presented Logan with a handwritten sheet of paper.
“What’s this?” The DCI asked, squinting at the indecipherable series of swirls and squiggles.
“Loan agreement. As you can see, he wasn’t due to start paying me back until next week. I had no beef with Bernie, pal. In fact, I’m pretty much the last person who wanted him dead. So, if it’s a murderer you’re looking for, you’re barking up the wrong tree.”
The dog was closing in. Tyler could no longer just hear it, he would swear he could feel it, too. The vibrations of its paws hitting the ground. The warm swirl of its breath on the back of his legs, even through the mascot outfit.
He could sense its hunger, too. Its hatred, and its rage. Its desire to sink its teeth into Tyler’s juicy flesh, and rip it from his bones.
It was going to eat him alive. He was sure of it. No doubt in his head. This four-legged torpedo—this furry land shark—was closing in on him. Any second now, it would make the leap. There would be pain. He’d fall. And then, squirrel suit or no squirrel suit, his world would be nothing but sharp teeth, dog breath, and a growing number of open wounds.
Why hadn’t be brought the dog treats? He could’ve thrown them. They might have bought him a second or two to climb a tree. He could’ve waited there for Logan to come find him. Or, if it really came to it, lived there indefinitely.
But oh no, he’d gone racing off without a thought, determined to catch the fleeing suspect, and desperate to impress the boss.
He stumbled as that realisation hit him, and almost tripped. God. It was pathetic, really. He was going to die—he was going to be eaten alive, in fact—just to win Logan’s approval. Just to get a pat on the head, or a nod of acknowledgement.
Is that really what it had come to? Is that how far he’d sunk?
“Bollocks to that,” he said, the words wheezing out between pained breaths.
Tyler stopped running. He turned and saw the dog thirty yards behind, but closing fast. He raised a hand like he was directing traffic.
“Stop!”
The dog did not stop.
“Sit!”
The dog did not sit. If anything, it ran faster.
Tyler tried to summon more confidence, but the fast-approaching hellhound was making that a challenge. He thrust his hand out further, raised his voice, and bellowed a, “Stay!”
But the dog, to his disappointment, did not stay. And now, there was no time for it to stop, or sit, or do very much of anything. It was almost on him now.
It was almost the end.
“OK, bad plan,” Tyler whispered. Then, he jammed his arms straight down at his sides, stood tall, shut his eyes, and waited for the end.
There was a gust of wind as the dog raced straight past him. He opened first one eye, and then the other, and turned to follow the sound of barking.
Just a handful of seconds later, he heard a yelp from through the trees up ahead, and the pitiful protests of an out of breath old man.
“Argh! No! Down! Fucking quit that! Stop humping ma leg!”
“Oh, thank God for that,” Tyler muttered. Then, after a couple of steadying breaths, he set off to round up the suspect.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Hamza was leaving the office when he almost collided with Ben coming the other way.