Costa Del Corpse

Costa del Corpse by Jack Treby Table of Contents Costa del Corpse Also by Jack Treby Copyright Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen The Book of Death Hurrah for Hilary! The Stiletto Murder At Flaxton Isle The Gunpowder Treason Also by Jack Treby THE SIMON TURING MYSTERIES The Book of Death The Bonfire Night Massacre Costa del Corpse The Stiletto The Pineapple Republic The Scandal at Bletchley The Red Zeppelin The Devil’s Brew Hilary and the Hurricane (a novelette) A Poison of Passengers Hurrah for Hilary! Copyright © Jack Treby 2023 Published by Carter & Allan The Author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers Cover by James at GoOnWrite.com Chapter One ‘Bloody hell!’ Susan Maybury exclaimed as a loud bang sounded beneath us and the hire car swerved onto the left-hand side of the road. I dropped the map I was holding and Susan gripped the steering wheel tightly, trying to bring the vehicle back under control. The metal frame of the Seat Panda was rattling all around us and only the seatbelts were keeping us from flying through the air. Up ahead, to add to our troubles, a large brown pickup truck was coming around a curve in the road. ‘Look out!’ I yelled as the vehicle hurtled towards us. Susan yanked the steering wheel sharply to the right. The driver of the truck saw us just in time and swerved left, the large vehicle pulling past us with barely a couple of inches to spare. My hands were in my mouth as our wing mirror clipped the side of the truck and the jolt sent us spinning even further off track. We juddered along the verge at the side of the road as the man let off his horn in anger. Susan pulled us back onto the track and, as we rounded the corner, she brought the car to a clattering halt. For a moment, we sat in silence, numb with shock. Susan’s hands were still gripping the steering wheel. ‘Blimey, that was close,’ she breathed. She shot me a nervous grin, the adrenaline pumping through her. ‘Too close,’ I said, my face pale with shock. She pulled her hands from the steering wheel and turned off the engine, then took another deep breath. ‘What happened?’ I asked, at last. The car was brand new. We had picked it up from the airport less than an hour ago. ‘It felt like we hit something.’ Susan unclipped her seatbelt. ‘We very nearly did.’ She laughed uneasily, glancing back through the rear window. The truck had disappeared from view in a cloud of dust. The driver hadn’t bothered to stop. But we were alive, that was the main thing. ‘I think a tyre must have blown.’ She gazed at the broken wing mirror and pulled a face. ‘That’s going to cost us.’ Flipping down her sunglasses, she opened the side door and stepped out onto the parched grass at the side of the road. A set of bushes lined the narrow verge. Susan looked down at the wheel and gave it a sharp kick. ‘Yep, flat as a pancake,’ she confirmed. I got out of the car and came around to join her on the verge. Susan crouched down to take a closer look at the tyre. She was already in full holiday mode, in light brown shorts and a white top, tied at the front. I was in long trousers and a short sleeved shirt. The air was dusty and still, and there was barely a cloud in the sky. It was early afternoon and the temperature was uncomfortably hot. ‘I think it might have been a bit of glass,’ she said, peering down at the tyre. Susan was in her early twenties, a year or so younger than me, with a rounded face, wide brown eyes and dark, shoulder-length hair. ‘Yeah, there’s definitely some glass in there. Some idiot must have dropped a bottle or something in the road.’ I glanced up and down the track. There was nothing in sight bar the gravel, the bushes and the mountains in the distance. I scratched my head. ‘What are we going to do?’ I looked up at the roof rack. Our luggage was still in place, thank goodness. With all the bumps in the road, I was worried the suitcases might have fallen off. Susan pulled herself up and shot me a reassuring smile. ‘Don’t worry. We’ll get it sorted. It’s all part of the fun, isn’t it?’ She liked to look on the bright side. It was one of her most attractive qualities. She wiped a bead of sweat from her brow. ‘Mind you, I think you could have chosen a better road. We’re in the middle of nowhere here.’ I laughed. She was right about that. It was unlikely anyone would be coming this way any time soon. ‘You and your map reading,’ she teased. ‘Blimey, it’s hot. You didn’t see a garage anywhere, did you?’ ‘Not since we left the coast road.’ We had arrived at the airport around eleven this morning and left in the hire car a little after midday. We’d turned off the coast road about an hour after that. It was too far to walk back to it in this heat. ‘Ah well.’ Susan shrugged. ‘I’ll check the boot. You never know, there might be a spare tyre in there.’ I raised an eyebrow. ‘Could you change a tyre?’ I asked. She had an uncle who was a mechanic, so it was not beyond the bounds of possibility. ‘Probably. As long