Page 48 of His Worst Crime

Ramon allowed him a moment, before saying, “When he comes to, he’ll be charged for the assault and battery that occurred here at Ravenscragg Stud.”

“No, no, you’ve got the wrong bloke. Davey wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

“Who is the right bloke we should get then?” Jaume asked aggressively.

“Oh no, you’re not taking me down that path. What would I know about that?”

Instead of answering him, Ramon prompted, “So you’d testify that he wasn’t the violent intruder that—?”

But Owen immediately sensed the direction of his questioning.

“No, no way, I’ve got nothing to add I didn’t tell the police before. You’d—“

“Come on, he’s your brother. Surely you can vouch whether he has the character to commit a violent crime?”

But Jaume broke in over Ramon, almost spitting in his forcefulness, his English becoming even more broken as he eyeballed Owen aggressively:

“It like this: your brother, he a criminal, guilty of smashing an old man, no? He attack your father, we know. We have the fingerprints on the iron bar. I going to send him to prison for years and years! What you think of that?”

“No! No!” Owen protested.

“Yes! Yes!” Jaume barked. “Straight from the hospital into the prison, and I going to throw away the effing key!”

Jaume’s words seemed to afflict Owen almost physically. Ramon had the sense just to keep quiet then, letting Jaume play the bad cop.

“No!” Owen said tersely in a low voice. He kept his gaze down, staring at his beer, but didn’t reach for it.

“What is it, violent, no violent?” Jaume snapped like a Dobermann. “Your brother does attempted murder his father or no?”

“No.” Owen repeated, surly.

“So, tell us what happened,” Ramon said quietly. “Why were his fingerprints on that bar?”

It concerned him that they were here, interrogating Owen in a pub, when they didn’t even have official jurisdiction to be here, or even to make inquiries in the UK. Where was Beaton? He was tempted to pull out his phone to start recording, but he didn’t want to interrupt Owen, or spook him. Owen kept his head down, staring at the beer in front of him, but not saying anything.

“When Davey comes out of his coma, he’s going into prison,” Ramon said harshly, not quite trusting his voice to get the words out. “Is that what you want?”

Owen shook his head, still refusing to look at them, but he said:

“Tell me about Davey, please.”

Ramon and Jaume exchanged a look.

He was working at a stables in Barcelona,“ Ramon said. “A friend of mine owns them, in fact. I met him….”

Owen looked up quickly at him. “Yeah, how was he?”

“He’s gifted with horses. He treated my gelding, Estel, after he’d gone lame and got infected with Cellulitis.”

“Yeah, he knows his stuff,” Owen said. “Should be studying to be a vet. He’s got what it takes.”

“Instead he going to prison,” Jaume broke in, “for a crime he not do.”

Owen looked at him, and then down at his beer.

“He didn’t do it, did he?” Ramon asked.

Owen sighed.