Page 16 of The Sunken Truth (Lily Larkin Mysteries #5)

Chapter Sixteen

Without any discussion, Lily took control of the boat.

Lowen was right that it was easy to handle, and with the crystal-clear water she didn’t have any concerns about submerged obstacles.

She was also surprised at how familiar the archipelago was to her, despite only having been on boat trips with Seren and Kit a few times.

“It was weird what Lowen said about Eustace,” she said while the wind whipped at her hair.

“Which bit?”

“About the pirates. I wonder why Eustace didn’t mention that to us. He told us an entirely different version of events.”

“Because it’s not true. It’s just stories.”

“I don’t think he’d lie about his grandad being the captain of the ship. That’s probably easy to verify.”

“I’m not saying that part isn’t true. It’s the gold smuggling I don’t buy. And I’m not saying he’s lying. Maybe his grandfather liked to embellish stories for him. It probably didn’t even occur to him that he’d believe it. Or that he’d continue to believe it in adulthood.”

“You might be right,” Lily mused, pulling strands of hair from her mouth. “I think I’m like Lowen – I want to believe his stories. There’s something magical about them.”

“He should really get his story straight if he wants people to believe it,” Flynn said. “It doesn’t really matter, anyway. I only had to ask him to stop offering rewards. Now we need to focus on figuring out who cut Ryan’s air supply this morning.”

Lily nodded and they descended into silence. It took ten minutes at a slow pace for them to reach St Martin’s. Following Lowen’s directions, they found the quay easily. It helped that it held a flag advertising the dive school, and the office was also visible at the top of the quay.

“The dive boat’s here,” Flynn remarked, while Lily slowed them and levelled out alongside the concrete jetty. When the boat kissed the quay, Flynn hopped out and tied up.

The sun was still high in the sky as they strolled towards the dive centre, tucked at the top of the quay and overlooking a long sandy bay where the turquoise sea lapped gently against the white sand.

At the side of the squat, white-washed building, the woman from their morning dive hosed off wetsuits and hung them to dry on a rail. Along the wall, dive tanks stood in a neat row.

“Hello, again,” she said, turning the hose off when she noticed them. “I hope your day’s going better than mine.”

Flynn frowned. “Everything okay?”

“Yes. But the site of the shipwreck has been closed to the public. We had a tour group out there about to enter the water when we were told no one else could dive there. They’re demanding a refund.”

“Couldn’t you have taken them to dive elsewhere?” Flynn asked.

“We did, but afterwards they insisted they’d specifically booked a dive of the shipwreck and anything else wasn’t good enough.”

Lily inhaled the scent of neoprene and seaweed, which hung in the air. “Surely they can’t refuse to pay when it wasn’t your fault the dive site was closed. Especially if you moved to another dive site.”

The woman reached for a coat hanger and deposited the wetsuit onto the rack. “You’re assuming all people are reasonable, which is unfortunately not the case.” She sighed heavily. “Things are hard enough without people threatening bad reviews if you don’t give them their money back.”

With a quick shake of her head, she switched her attention to Lily and smiled warmly. “Sorry. Here I am complaining and we haven’t even met properly. I’m Nat.” She offered her hand. “You own the ice cream shop, don’t you? Lily, isn’t it?”

“Yes.” She shook her hand as a door opened at the side of the building.

“I thought you were talking to yourself again,” Harry said, resting a hand at Nat’s back as he came to stand beside her. “Hi, again,” he said, shaking hands with Flynn and then Lily. “If you’ve come to ask me more about what happened this morning, I’d really like to know, too.”

“It’s certainly worrying,” Flynn said flatly.

“The most worrying thing is that while Ryan believes it was me, he won’t consider the possibility that it was someone closer to home.”

“Harry!” Nat hissed. “I told you not to accuse people. You don’t know who it was.”

“Except I was in the water this morning and I can tell you exactly who it wasn’t. And by that process of elimination, I can also tell you who it was.”

Flynn stood straighter. “Care to enlighten me? ”

“Kurt. The Australian guy.”

Lily opened her mouth to speak, but Flynn got there first. “What makes you think it was him?”

“I told you, I know who it wasn’t. There’s no way you’d ever convince me it was Kit or Seren.

Not just because they’d never do such a thing, but also because they were further out, like us.

That only leaves Kurt or Benji. I’ve known Benji since he was a kid.

He wouldn’t do something like that. So that leaves Kurt as the main suspect as far as I’m concerned. ”

“You didn’t see him do it, though?” Flynn asked.

“No. I didn’t see it happen at all, but as far as I remember Kurt was diving pretty close to Ryan.”

Flynn scribbled in his notebook. “And Benji was with him?”

“I think so.” He paused. “Kurt also used to work for us last summer, so we know him pretty well.”

“You didn’t want to take him on again this summer?” Flynn asked.

“No.” Harry glanced at his wife.

She shrugged. “He’s a decent worker, but there was always something a little off about him. Hard to put my finger on it. He just didn’t match our vibe.”

“He also wasn’t that reliable.” Harry’s gaze was on his wife again.

“Do you remember he buggered off to Ibiza with no notice because he’d got a job DJ-ing.

” He shook his head. “He likes to jet around doing casual, seasonal work. Diving, or DJ-ing – skiing in the winter. If you ask me, it’s a bit sad – he’s thirty something and he acts like a twenty-year-old. ”

Nat snorted a laugh. “Harry might also be a little jealous of his lifestyle.”

“No way,” Harry said. “I can’t think of anything worse than bouncing around the planet the way he does. ”

Lily stifled a smile while Flynn remained perfectly poised beside her.

“Thanks for chatting to us,” he said in his businesslike tone. “I’m going to be questioning everyone who was there this morning.”

“Good. I’d feel a lot better if you find out what happened.”

Flynn nodded sagely. “I fully intend to get to the bottom of it.”