Page 62 of The Sunken Truth

“Thanks,” Flynn said, realising the landlord was looking at him expectantly. “That’s helpful.”

“Is it?”

Flynn grunted. “I’m not sure. Maybe.”

“Is there something going on I should know about?”

“No.” Flynn offered his hand again and thanked Calvin for his help.

On his way out of the pub, he checked his watch, thenpicked up his pace on the sandy path. The hedge at the side of the lane shuddered against gusts which seemed to gather strength by the minute.

He wasn’t at all surprised by the message from Zack which pinged on his phone just as he was reaching Harry and Nat’s place.

How long you going to be?he asked.I don’t like the look of this weather.

Flynn tapped rapidly.Give me fifteen minutes?

A thumbs up emoji came through.

It didn’t take Nat long to answer when Flynn rang the bell – possibly because he pressed it three times in quick succession like an impatient child.

“Everything okay?” she asked.

“I need to speak with you and Harry again. I hope it’s not a bad time.”

She glanced behind him, eyes darting up to the foreboding grey clouds. “It’s fine. Come in.”

As he closed the door behind him, Nat shouted up the stairs to Harry, then led him through to the kitchen. “Have a seat.”

Thunder rumbled and he shook his head, not keen to sit. His eyes shifted to the hall as footsteps sounded on the stairs.

“Hi,” Harry said, a puzzled ring to the single syllable.

“I’ll get straight to the point,” Flynn said as more thunder sounded in the distance. “I’m still looking into the incident at the wreck. Whatever Ryan found out there hasn’t been discovered by the dive crews, which leads me to believe someone took it from the dive site immediately after Ryan’s hose was cut.”

“Okay,” Harry said, an impatient bite to his words. “We already told you what we know.”

“Yes. But it’s come to my attention that the two of you have been having financial difficulties.”

“And?” Harry snapped, taking a protective step in front of his wife.

Flynn eyed the man levelly. “And if I have my facts right, Nat paid off a large bar bill yesterday, which had been outstanding for some time.”

Nat pressed her lips together and moved to sit at the small table by the wall.

“What’s that got to do with anything?” Harry asked, pulling his shoulders back as he took a step towards Flynn.

“Surely you can see how it looks.”

Nat exhaled a shaky breath. “It looks as though I sabotaged Ryan’s gear to get my hands on something from the shipwreck, which I could then sell to pay off our debts.”

“Is that what happened?” Flynn asked.

“No.” Nat shook her head. “I would never do that.”

Ignoring Harry’s threatening stance, Flynn stepped around him and approached his wife. “It would be really helpful if you could explain how you did get the money, so I can put the timing down to coincidence.”

“Of course it was a coincidence,” Harry said, anger rife in his tone. “Nat would never hurt anyone, or do anything that might cause harm.”