Read Two Evils: A DI Charlotte Savage Novel for Free Online Page B

Right into the bone. Wireline it was, so the skipper had no choice but to cut my thumb off, else I’d have been dragged down to the deeps.’ Larry turned to the crate of spider crabs. ‘That lot would have been eating me, instead of the other way round.’
    ‘He was out there late yesterday afternoon. Some time about five or six o’clock. Did you see him?’
    ‘Seen nothing. Around then I was probably cooking my tea.’

    ‘We have a couple of witnesses who saw him hanging around on the shore near here.’
    ‘Really?’ Larry’s voice was deadpan, wholly disinterested. ‘Told you, I saw nothing.’
    ‘Here.’ Savage reached into her jacket and pulled out the misper leaflet she had of Jason. ‘This is the lad. Maybe you didn’t see him yesterday, but can you tell me if you recognise him? His name’s Jason.’
    Larry held out his hand, the one with no thumb, his first two fingers open like scissors in a rock-paper-scissors game. The fingers clamped shut on the picture. Like crab claws, Savage thought.
    ‘Jason you say? Interesting.’ Larry stared down at the image as if the name would allow him access to some secret hidden in the ink. ‘Jason. I have seen him before, but I didn’t know his name, more’s the pity.’
    ‘When did you last see him?’
    ‘I swapped some bait he dug for a couple of crabs. Some time a few weeks ago. Maybe before that too. Good lad from what I remember. Polite.’
    ‘He came here? Onto your boat?’
    ‘Yeah. Stood right where you’re standing now.’ Larry smiled and then glanced down at the deck. A pile of fish guts sat near a pool of blood up against a hatch in the deck. Larry nodded at the hatch. ‘I invited him in for a cuppa, but the lad said no. Was something in his eyes. I didn’t push it. People talk, love, don’t they? A man and a young boy? Doesn’t bear thinking about what folks would say. Mind you, when folks do talk, you lot don’t do anything, do you?’
    ‘What are you getting at, Larry? Do you know something?’
    ‘Lass, I know a whole lot more than I’m telling, but not about the boy. Seen this sort of thing afore, years ago, but nobody believed anyone then. I’d be looking closer to home if I were you.’

    ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘He was unhappy. I told you, I could see it in his eyes. Deep down.’
    ‘Thanks for the advice.’ Savage turned to go. She didn’t need help from a crazy old fisherman turned psychologist. His pipe may well have been found out near the wreck, but the man knew nothing. ‘If you think of anything else give us a call. The number’s below the photo.’
    ‘No good to me, love,’ Larry said. ‘I ain’t got no phone. If I need to, I’ll come in and see you, right?’
    ‘Yes,’ Savage said, visualising a horde of spider crabs crawling over the desks in the crime suite. ‘You do that.’
    Pete was doing his impression of a pizza chef as Savage came into the kitchen at a little after six thirty, a sing-song of mock-Italian words in a heavy accent accompanying his antics. Jamie, Savage’s seven-year-old son, laughed uncontrollably as a circle of dough spun in the air, flying dangerously close to the ceiling.
    ‘Mamma mia, Mummy’s home!’ Pete said as the pizza base fell just beyond his reach and folded into a pile on the floor. ‘Shit.’
    ‘Daddy swore, Mummy!’ Jamie said. ‘He used the S word.’
    ‘He said “shovel it”, sweetheart.’ Savage walked over to Pete and cast him a stern look. ‘As in shovel the pizza off the floor.’
    ‘He didn’t! He said sh …’ Jamie paused. ‘You know. The same as the C word.’
    ‘The C word?’ Savage stared at Jamie, thinking that having a fourteen-year-old sister wasn’t altogether a good thing for the lad. ‘Spell it.’
    ‘C. R. A. P.’

    ‘Oh.’ Savage stood next to her husband and stared down at the mess on the floor. ‘Well I’m sure I don’t know that C word or the S word, but I do know I’m hungry.’
    ‘There’s more.’ Pete pointed to a