The Bessiere Files

Chapter 1.
By the time she crossed the bridge, the dog was surging at the end of the lead, paws scrabbling on the damp boards. Now he wasn’t just pulling—he was fighting.
Rain fell as softly as snowflakes on the stream below. The boards beneath her boots were slippery, the handrail beaded with cold drops. She tightened her grip on the lead.
He reached the end of the bridge and kept going. The collar slipped, and he was gone in a heartbeat, hurling himself down the muddy embankment in a frenzy. His bark—usually a happy, friendly sound—tore through the air: sharp, frantic, wrong. Her stomach lurched.
She called him several times. He refused to leave the water’s edge and continued to bark wildly. She dropped to her knees, seized the rail, then scrambled after him. Mud gave way under her boots. One hand clawed at the wet grass, nails filling with earth as she slid the last yard to the bottom.
The dog stood at the edge of the stream, stiff‑legged, still barking hysterically at something in the water. She followed his gaze. The current nudged it, rolling it just enough to let light fall on the skin. A man lay in the shallows beneath the wooden footbridge—face down, one arm twisted under him, half in the water, half out, head at an awkward angle. His clothes were dirty, dishevelled and water‑bloated, clinging to a body that should not have been there.
The dog kept barking. Rain drummed harder on the red hood of her coat. She stared, unable to move, as the babbling stream rocked the dead man gently against the stones.
She wrenched her phone from her rain-drenched coat and frantically dialled triple nine.