Page 68 of Hang on St. Christopher

“You’ve good eyes, son. You get a reg of this bike?” Crabbie asked.

“Didn’t think to. Sorry.”

“What did this guy look like?” I asked.

“That I can tell you,” he said, and paused.

I took out my wallet and counted out fifty quid. He reached out to take it and I held it backRockford Filesstyle. “This better be kosher.”

He grabbed the money. “Now, admittedly, I only saw him from the back—” he began, and I made to grab the cash back, but Killian tucked it into his pocket.

“Six foot one, medium build, gingery-blond hair, pale, probably left-handed because he was carrying his bike helmet in his left hand. A Shoei helmet. He was wearing Levi’s and a black motorcycle jacket,” he said quickly.

“Well, that’s something,” Crabbie said, taking out his pipe.

“Not worth fifty quid,” I muttered. I gave Killian my card. “If you see him around here again or anywhere else in Carrick, you give me a call. There’s another fifty in it for you.”

“It’s a deal. Hey, Duffy.”

“What?”

“Did you hear about the dyslexic guy who walks into a bra?”

I tried to clip him on the ear, but he had already drifted into the shadows.

Back at the station, we filed our incident reports with the duty sergeant and checked the logs to see if the Range Rover had shown up, but there was no sign of it.

The sun was now fully up over Scotland, and the traffic was increasing on the Marine Highway through Lawson’s window.

“You know when I took my spill last night, a motorbike rode right past me. A black bike. A black Norton maybe. I was dazed and out of it, but maybe it was a black Norton,” I said.

“Bit of a coincidence, eh?” McCrabban said.

“And you don’t like coincidences, do you?”

“And neither do you,” he said.

“Nope. Can’t stand the bastards.”

CHAPTER10

DEAD RECKONING

I finally hit the hay at seven-thirty a.m., and woke up four hours later fetally curled in the bed, shivering, discontented, but somehow, oddly, well rested. When I made it downstairs, I tried to call home, but Beth and Emma had left for nursery school.

The answering machine kicked in, and I left a message: “Hey, guys, all’s well here. The case is going well. I’m safe. I’ll come see you on the weekend if it’s not all wrapped up by then.”

I knew that the cat was listening to the message with chilly indifference, as was his wont. I stared out at Coronation Road. Rain was pouring out of the gutters and bucketing against the windows.

My back was covered in bruises, and it hurt like hell.

My teeth were chattering.

I tapped the thermometer on the wall. The mercury was hovering around the four degrees Celsius mark. This didn’t surprise me. It would never snow at sea level at this time of year, but just about every other type of miserable weather was possible.

Downstairs, wrapped in the duvet. Open the front door. No milk. Didn’t understand it. Trevor, the milkman, knew to leave me a bottle of Gold Top every day that I was staying on Coronation Road. And he knew what nights I was staying on Coronation Road, because I lifted the little flag over the milk box. I checked that the wee “Antrim Dairies” flag was raised—it was—but no milk.

“Are you looking for your milk?” a voice asked.