Almost.
Squeezy asked cheerfully to Ben, ‘You got any rounds left?’ He mimed aiming. Max was too far away to see if he went pale, but he backed off to the far side of his allotted space and sat with his back to them for a while.
Squeezy lay back, delighted with the sunshine on his face, plucking blades of grass and occasionally chucking them at Ben or Aleksey. ‘This could take a while ‘less someone does something.’
Ben batted his hand away at the latest missile strike. ‘That’s what I said. I want to go.’
Squeezy blew his cheeks out. Before he could comment, Aleksey offered, ‘Five pounds says he will not be on there in another…hmm…two hours.’
Squeezy sat up. ‘Wager! I like it. Okay, I say by sunset.’
‘It has to be an actual time or you will cheat.’
‘Eight o’clock tonight then. Diesel?’
Ben narrowed his eyes, considering. ‘Midnight. He allowed himself to be smashed in the nose by his own guy to make it look authentic. He’s not a compete coward.’
Aleksey laughed. ‘Exactly, that’s why I will win the bet. You are not such a good student of human nature as me, grasshopper.’
Ben dug him in the ribs—again. It never hurt less. ‘I don’t think anyone wants to know how you got your deeply disturbing knowledge of that subject.’
‘I do.’ Squeezy smirked and added, ‘And it’s I: student of human natureas I. Notas me.’
Aleksey turned his head and regarded the other man. ‘Seriously? You? Correcting me? Who learnt his English from the best—?’
‘Hah! Maybe my fucking tutors were better than yours, Crusoe, you ever considered that?’
Aleksey smirked at Squeezy’s assertion, but kept his thoughts about the man’s history to himself.
‘Has anyone got the time on them?’ Ben was ignoring their squabble, as ever, concentrating on the hunched back of the man on the far side of the new sea stack.
Squeezy was the only one with a watch, so he was nominated as time-keeper. He took his job very seriously, calling out every ten minutes that passed. At the hour mark, yawning, either with boredom or because he had not slept for a good seventy-two hours, he remarked, ‘Five pounds seems a bit fucking stingy for someone richer than Mr Moobs himself. How ‘bout we up the ante a tad?’
Ben huffed. ‘What have you got that either of us would want?’
Squeezy put a hand to his heart, theatrically wounded, but added deceptively casually, ‘How about if I win I get to keep what I found in the attic.’ Aleksey immediately turned to him, taking his eyes off what he was fairly sure was going to become extremely interesting very soon. ‘I was clearing it all out for little Squirt to ride her champion steed to victory in the Grand National, and there it was—hidden. It’s very, very intriguing. So, I win, I get to keep it—and you’re never allowed to fucking nag me about it or even ask what it is. Agreed?’
‘What is it?’ He was angry with himself both for falling into the moron’s obvious trap and for the tone in his voice (although he conceded neither of the other two had met him when he was six and so probably wouldn’t have heard what he did).
Squeezy just mimed zipping his lips. Aleksey clenched his jaw and turned away. ‘Then I want to change my time.’
Even Ben weighed in on Squeezy’s side at that—that was just blatant cheating—so he was stuck. The moron was annoying all the time, but when he was gleeful it made Aleksey want to kill something. Or someone. He glanced down at the drop and did a quick calculation in his head.
However, totally back under control, he just nodded casually, and asked, ‘And if I win? I do not need five pounds either, as you so helpfully pointed out.’
Squeezy narrowed his eyes, clearly sensing a similar trap. ‘Okaaay, name your new terms.’
‘If I win, I get Harry.’
Ben turned and gave him an odd look. Squeezy had gone instantly rigid, alert to some threat he could not yet identify. Aleksey clarified for him very happily. ‘He and I get to sort things between us any way I choose, and you never say one word to me—or to him—about it.’
Squeezy shrugged, utterly nonchalant, but it wasn’t his best deceit. ‘Sure. Why not? The old bastard couldn’t even come into the hotel because of his fucking wobblies or some crap, so he’s buggered off anyway. Him and the little fleabag. Just...poof…gone.’
Aleksey wasn’t surprised to hear this, but wanted things settled. ‘So that’s agreed? Not one comment, one aside, one angry word to me or him?’
Squeezy nodded, but his assault on the grass increased in ferocity.
‘Oh, bloody hell.’ Ben scrambled to his feet.
