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Snow Falling by Davidson King
RATING:
Davidson King
EMAIL: John492@att.net
The Mystery of the Moving Image by CS Poe
Here at Padme's Library I feature all genres but followers have probably noticed that 95% of the posts and 99% of my reviews fall under the LGBT genres, so for this year's Pride Month I am showcasing 20 of my favorite M/M mysteries in no particular order. Mysteries of all sorts, different eras, different crimes, basically mayhem of all varieties perfectly blended with romance, drama, humor, and heart, creating unforgettable reads.
One Last Note:
Some of those on my list I have read, reread, & even listened/re-listened so I've included the review posted in my latest read/listen. Also, those that are read/re-read as a series the latest review may be an overall series review. I have also tried to include links to previous posts for those that are part of a series.
One Last Note:
Some of those on my list I have read, reread, & even listened/re-listened so I've included the review posted in my latest read/listen. Also, those that are read/re-read as a series the latest review may be an overall series review. I have also tried to include links to previous posts for those that are part of a series.
Summary:
Haven Hart #1
After running from a past destined to kill him, Snow has been hiding on the streets.
Tell nobody your name.
Tell nobody your secrets.
Trust nobody!
These are the rules of the streets.
His entire life changes when he saves an eight-year-old boy from a violent end.
Christopher Manos is one of the most powerful crime bosses in the country.
Don’t ask anyone to do something you aren’t willing to do yourself.
Secrets can get you killed.
Trust nobody!
These are the rules he lives by.
When his eight-year-old nephew disappears, he never expects the boy’s savior to end up being his own.
A man with a dangerous past and a man with a dangerous future find love amidst murder and mayhem. But with Snow's life being threatened at every turn, will Christopher's best be enough to prevent Snow Falling?
Saturday Series Spotlight: Part 1 / Part 2
The Mystery of the Moving Image by CS Poe
Summary:
Snow & Winter #3
It’s summer in New York City, and antique shop owner Sebastian Snow is taking the next big step in his relationship with NYPD homicide detective, Calvin Winter: they’re moving in together. What should have been a wonderful week of playing house and celebrating Calvin’s birthday comes to an abrupt end when a mysterious package arrives at the Emporium.
Inside is a Thomas Edison Kinetoscope, a movie viewer from the nineteenth century, invented by the grandfather of modern cinema, W. K. L. Dickson. And along with it, footage of a murder that took place over a hundred years ago.
Sebastian resists the urge to start sleuthing, even if the culprit is long dead and there’s no apparent danger. But break-ins at the Emporium, a robbery, and dead bodies aren’t as easy to ignore, and Sebastian soon realizes that the century-old murder will lead him to a modern-day killer.
However, even with Sebastian’s vast knowledge of Victorian America and his unrelenting perseverance in the face of danger, this may be the one mystery he won’t survive.
Saturday Series Spotlight: Part 1
Anarchy by Olivier Bosman
Summary:
DS Billings Mysteries #4
The year is 1894. Europe has been suffering from a series of Anarchist terror attacks, the latest of which was the bombing of a Parisian textile mill which killed thirteen people. The perpetrators of this act - the seven Hirsch Brothers - are believed to be on the run in London. Billings, Flynt and Clarkson are called in by Special Branch to help locate them. But the investigation goes spectacularly wrong. One by one, the Hirsch Brothers are found dead and the police have no idea who is killing them.
Saturday Series Spotlight: Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3
Two Feet Under by Charlie Cochrane
Summary:
Lindenshaw Mysteries #3
Things are looking up for Adam Matthews and Robin Bright—their relationship is blossoming, and they’ve both been promoted. But Robin’s a policeman, and that means murder is never far from the scene.
When a body turns up in a shallow grave at a Roman villa dig site—a body that repeatedly defies identification—Robin finds himself caught up in a world of petty rivalries and deadly threats. The case seems to want to drag Adam in, as well, and their home life takes a turn for the worse when an ex-colleague gets thrown out of his house and ends up outstaying his welcome at theirs.
While Robin has to prove his case against a manipulative and fiendishly clever killer, Adam is trying to find out which police officer is leaking information to the media. And both of them have to work out how to get their home to themselves again, which might need a higher intelligence than either a chief inspector or a deputy headteacher.
Saturday Series Spotlight: Part 1 / Part 2
A Party to Murder by John Inman
Summary:
When Jamie Roma and Derek Lee find their blossoming love affair interrupted by dual invitations to a house party from a mysterious unnamed host, they think, Sounds like fun. The next thing they know they are caught up in a game of cat and mouse that quickly starts racking up a lot of dead mice. Yikes, they think. Not so fun.
Trapped inside a spooky old house in the middle of nowhere, with the body count rising among their fellow guests, they begin to wonder if they’ll escape with their lives. As a cataclysmic storm swoops in to batter the survivors, the horror mounts.
Oddly enough, even in the midst of murder and mayhem, Jamie and Derek’s love continues to thrive.
While the guest list thins, so does the list of suspects. Soon it’s only them and the killer.
And then the battle really begins.
Haven Hart #1
After running from a past destined to kill him, Snow has been hiding on the streets.
Tell nobody your name.
Tell nobody your secrets.
Trust nobody!
These are the rules of the streets.
His entire life changes when he saves an eight-year-old boy from a violent end.
Christopher Manos is one of the most powerful crime bosses in the country.
Don’t ask anyone to do something you aren’t willing to do yourself.
Secrets can get you killed.
Trust nobody!
These are the rules he lives by.
When his eight-year-old nephew disappears, he never expects the boy’s savior to end up being his own.
A man with a dangerous past and a man with a dangerous future find love amidst murder and mayhem. But with Snow's life being threatened at every turn, will Christopher's best be enough to prevent Snow Falling?
Saturday Series Spotlight: Part 1 / Part 2
Summary:
Snow & Winter #3
It’s summer in New York City, and antique shop owner Sebastian Snow is taking the next big step in his relationship with NYPD homicide detective, Calvin Winter: they’re moving in together. What should have been a wonderful week of playing house and celebrating Calvin’s birthday comes to an abrupt end when a mysterious package arrives at the Emporium.
Inside is a Thomas Edison Kinetoscope, a movie viewer from the nineteenth century, invented by the grandfather of modern cinema, W. K. L. Dickson. And along with it, footage of a murder that took place over a hundred years ago.
Sebastian resists the urge to start sleuthing, even if the culprit is long dead and there’s no apparent danger. But break-ins at the Emporium, a robbery, and dead bodies aren’t as easy to ignore, and Sebastian soon realizes that the century-old murder will lead him to a modern-day killer.
However, even with Sebastian’s vast knowledge of Victorian America and his unrelenting perseverance in the face of danger, this may be the one mystery he won’t survive.
Saturday Series Spotlight: Part 1
Summary:
DS Billings Mysteries #4
The year is 1894. Europe has been suffering from a series of Anarchist terror attacks, the latest of which was the bombing of a Parisian textile mill which killed thirteen people. The perpetrators of this act - the seven Hirsch Brothers - are believed to be on the run in London. Billings, Flynt and Clarkson are called in by Special Branch to help locate them. But the investigation goes spectacularly wrong. One by one, the Hirsch Brothers are found dead and the police have no idea who is killing them.
Saturday Series Spotlight: Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3
Summary:
Lindenshaw Mysteries #3
Things are looking up for Adam Matthews and Robin Bright—their relationship is blossoming, and they’ve both been promoted. But Robin’s a policeman, and that means murder is never far from the scene.
When a body turns up in a shallow grave at a Roman villa dig site—a body that repeatedly defies identification—Robin finds himself caught up in a world of petty rivalries and deadly threats. The case seems to want to drag Adam in, as well, and their home life takes a turn for the worse when an ex-colleague gets thrown out of his house and ends up outstaying his welcome at theirs.
While Robin has to prove his case against a manipulative and fiendishly clever killer, Adam is trying to find out which police officer is leaking information to the media. And both of them have to work out how to get their home to themselves again, which might need a higher intelligence than either a chief inspector or a deputy headteacher.
Saturday Series Spotlight: Part 1 / Part 2
Summary:
When Jamie Roma and Derek Lee find their blossoming love affair interrupted by dual invitations to a house party from a mysterious unnamed host, they think, Sounds like fun. The next thing they know they are caught up in a game of cat and mouse that quickly starts racking up a lot of dead mice. Yikes, they think. Not so fun.
Trapped inside a spooky old house in the middle of nowhere, with the body count rising among their fellow guests, they begin to wonder if they’ll escape with their lives. As a cataclysmic storm swoops in to batter the survivors, the horror mounts.
Oddly enough, even in the midst of murder and mayhem, Jamie and Derek’s love continues to thrive.
While the guest list thins, so does the list of suspects. Soon it’s only them and the killer.
And then the battle really begins.
Snow Falling by Davidson King
Original Audiobook Listen November 2019:
With the holidays, I actually reviewed book 4(From These Ashes) first but I did listen to the series in order. Snow still completely blows me away, Christopher is an awesome blending of hard ass and soft hugs. I guess that's what makes Snow and Christopher work so well, they compliment each other, they keep the other in check(or they try their hardest to do so😉).
As for the narration, well like I said in book 4, I've never listened to a book with dual narrators before but they worked perfectly. When I first started listening I thought Snow came across as jumpier, a little out of sync but the more I listened the more I realized that it was the perfect way to bring Snow's upbeat and snarky character to life. Could other narrators pull it off? Sure, but after hearing Joel Leslie and Philip Alces, I can't imagine anyone else bringing Haven Hart alive.
Original ebook Review December 2017:
When Snow comes upon a little boy in trouble and comes to his aid, he has no plans for it to lead to a new beginning he was just doing what he felt was right. Christopher may be the head of a family that has some questionable tactics but he is an honorable man so when his nephew is saved by a young man in an alley, he offers the man a job. Will either man let the future take root and grow or will their secrets get in the way?
Snow Falling is a masterpiece! That is the best way to explain what I read, nothing more, nothing less. It is a true masterpiece, a gem to be savored. When you factor in that this is a debut novel by the author, well frankly its hard to believe because its just so great. Now, I would be lying if I said I am unfamiliar with the author because I consider her a friend and kindred spirit and I have been cheering her on for several years. I knew her book would be good but even I was overwhelmed at how stunning and heartwarming Snow Falling is.
The characters, from Snow and Christopher to Roy and Bill to Lisa and Maggie, they all bring something to the story and not a single one is "window dressing" or "filler", they all have a part to play in the journey that is found within the covers of Snow Falling. I mention that because that is a rare thing, in my experience there is usually at least one character that could have been removed from the pages and the reader would not miss them but not here. Every character is intriguing in their own way and makes the story better.
As you know, I don't do spoilers so all I'll say in regards to the plot is WOW because I was hooked and had everyday life not got in the way I would have easily read this in one sitting. Talk about an easy read, and don't think I mean "easy" as in simple and short. No, I mean "easy" as in it grabs you from the first page and before you know it half the book is gone and then suddenly you find yourself at the epilogue. I started this review by saying Snow Falling is a masterpiece and I'll end with saying it has heart, no better way to say it: Snow Falling will break your heart, but it will also warm your heart.
The Mystery of the Moving Image by CS Poe
Original Review September 2018:
When Sebastian Snow receives one of the most unigue items he probably has ever seen, a working kenitiscope with a film reel he is completely confused as there is no information who sent it or why. Upon viewing the film he sees something he never thought possible, footage of a live murder from over 100 years ago. Can Calvin help him solve the century old murder and will solving Seb's case lead to solving the murders happening since receiving the film?
I didn't think it possible but I loved The Mystery of the Moving Image even more than the first two in the Snow & Winter series. Perhaps it's the movie lover in me that felt more connected to this one. Whatever the reason, Moving Image is brilliant! Intriguing, interesting, unique, and once again fun. That's right, CS Poe has made antiquing and murder fun😉😉
I won't say anything more about the plot and as far as Seb and Calvin's relationship goes I love how they keep moving forward. Calvin knows that Seb probably won't listen to him when he tells him to stay out of it and although this probably frustrates him he just takes a deep breath and does what he can to minimize the fallout. They balance each other out in so many ways.
As I just found this series I was able to read them one right after the other but I fear now that I will have to wait a while for the next installment but I know it will be well worth it and I eagerly await the wonders that Seb finds at his door next. I suppose technically each book is a standalone as the mystery begins and ends within the covers but I highly recommend reading them in order as the relationship between Seb and Calvin grows and there are minor mentions to the previous cases.
Anarchy by Olivier Bosman
Original ebook Review July 2019:
Anarchists, terrorist, or something more personal? When the missing Hirsch brothers keep turning up dead suddenly a case of anarchy is looking much more personal. Once again Olivier Bosman throws DS Billings headlong into a case that goes horribly wrong. Has he taken one too many wrong turns finally? For that you have to read yourself but trust me, it is well worth the time to find out.
I absolutely love this series, there is something about Billings that you just want to wrap the poor guy in a bear hug but it's going to take more than that to keep him safe. On the personal side, he's finally opening his heart up to his true nature, reluctantly but still more than he ever has before. Will he find happiness now that he's exploring his heart? You have to read that for yourself but I love how each entry brings him into himself more and perhaps not "risk" the consequences but he's not letting the fear completely shut him off from his heart.
As much of a history lover that I am, I have to admit 1890s England is not my area of knowledge short of what I've seen in films and read in fiction which I know is not always an accurate portrayal of the time. For that reason, I can't say with 100% certainty to the author's stick-to-it-ness of the era but I'm going to guess it is pretty real from what little I do know and that makes Anarchy even better.
The mystery, the romance, the history, all of these aspects makes Anarchy a great read and another great installment to the DS Billings Victorian Mysteries series. If you are new to this series I highly recommend reading it in order. Yes, each entry has a new case but as I already touched on DS Billings grows into accepting himself more and more with each book. The friction between him and his superior, the friendship between him and his partner, all these things continue from one case to the next making the personal side of each book flow better having read the previous ones. After the ending of Anarchy I can't help but fear Billings may suffer a few setbacks but then again it might serve as the kick-in-the-pants he needs to show him what's important. Either way I can't wait to see where Olivier Bosman takes his character next.
Two Feet Under by Charlie Cochrane
Original Review February 2018:
Adam Matthews and Robin Bright keep moving forward with their relationship and maintaining their homelife with beloved guard dog, Campbell. Now as they push forward with new positions in the workplace everything is looking up so what could go wrong? A spot of murder and an unexpected houseguest is what they face, throw in identiyfing Jane Doe, smug suspects, and a police leak to the media and the boys learn that maybe murder and mayhem will always find them.
I just want to start out by saying how much I love Adam and Robin, perhaps not as much as the author's other crime solving duo: Jonty and Orlando, but it's a pretty tight race. There is just something about Adam and Robin that makes me smile, maybe its their banter, their chemistry, or maybe its how the author makes them so real. Granted, most couples(no matter their occupation) don't find themselves in situations of repeated chaos like these boys but beyond that they come across as people you would meet filling the car with gas or picking up your weekly shopping. Whether the author meant for the reader to find this connection to the boys or its just a happy coincidence it still shows the talent and knack she has in bringing her characters to life. Speaking of chemistry, something that really showed it for me was their use of "Don't forget the milk" to convey "I love you". Not all couples say the actual "L-word" but they express it a thousand other ways and for me this was just another example of how Miss Cochrane make the boys more real.
Now, as for the mystery you know I won't reveal any spoilers and when it comes to this genre every little tidbit and snippet can be a huge clue so I really won't touch on the plot at all other than to say its brilliant. On a personal note, I really enjoyed how the author threw references to Midsomer Murders into a few scenes. Midsomer is my absolute favorite mystery series of all time(a little secret between you and me: I own all 19 seasons on DVD and have most of them nearly memorized😉). There is just something about the British, the UK as a whole really, and their way with murder, mayhem, and intrigue that sets them above the rest. I enjoy American mysteries but given the choice I can honestly say that I will pick a UK mystery over one of ours every time. I said all this because Two Feet Under is a perfect example of why I love mysteries from across the pond and the best way to explain my feelings without plot spoiling.
So, if you have already experienced The Best Corpse for the Job and Jury of One, than you know how lovely the author brings life to Adam and Robin. If you are new to this series than now is a great time to give it a looksee. Technically, yes each installment is a standalone as the mystery begins and ends within the pages of each book but personally, I can't imagine not reading Lindenshaw Mysteries in order. Between character development and references to previous cases it just flows better read 1,2, and 3 but no, I don't suppose it is a must. Those looking for detailed spicy-ness will probably be a bit disappointed but don't think that means that there is no passion and heat, it's just the author leaves these moments more to the reader's imagination and trust me I can imagine quite a bit 😉😉 So, grab a copy, buckle down, snuggle in and begin.
A Party to Murder by John Inman
Original Review July 2019:
John Inman has done it again! I've said it before and I'll say it again(and I'm sure it won't be the last time you'll hear me say it) the man knows how to bring danger, death, and destruction to the page and he manages to keep it fun and romantic too, its the whole package. Longtime friends have recently become friends with benefits who most likely both want more but haven't voiced it yet, receive invitations to a party in the woods from an unfamiliar name but decide to go because it sounds like a laugh, it's a stormy night in the middle of nowhere . . . what could go wrong? Practically everything.
So A Party to Murder sounds like a setup that has been done by many authors and Hollywood directors alike but John Inman makes it original with his own quirky blend of darkness, romance, mystery, and heat that keeps you on the edge of your seat. In a way it reads as a homage to Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None, Dashiell Hammet's The Thin Man, and any number of 80s horror flicks. You've got a cast of characters that keep dwindling, a dark and trapped setting, and then there is Derek and Jamie who may not be Nick and Nora Charles but their banter and obvious devotion to each other couldn't help but remind me of the chemistry the Charles' share.
Obviously I won't speak to the mystery aspect other than Party may not have had me fooled all the way up until the reveal but it didn't matter. Just because I suspected the who, it was the why that kept me on pins and needles. Just because my guess ended up being the who, doesn't mean I wasn't left wondering "am I right?" and on more than one occasion I found myself "or could it be ??? making this even more disturbing?" so just because you think you know, you really never truly know when it comes to John Inman.
As for Jamie and Derek, the friends with benefits, I think we all know they both want to be more than friends with benefits but its whether or not they'll open up to each other that gives A Party to Murder the romantic element. Some might think its not very believable that two people can find time for love when their fellow party guests are dropping like mayflies but what better time to be honest with your heart than when facing possible death? Not knowing if you'll be walking away is the perfect time to be true to one's heart. I loved their oddities that make them a perfect pair.
Throw in a cast of characters who don't know each other, who don't know the invitation sender, who have never been to the property, and what you have is a story that will keep you hooked from beginning to end. John Inman knows how to set the scene to make the reader feel as if they too got a mystery invitation to the creepy mansion in the woods and why it is perfectly understandable that Jamie, Derek, and everyone else on the fateful guest list would accept such an invite. A Party to Murder is definitely a win-win for mystery lovers, quirky lovers, romance lovers, heck its a win-win for any lover of good storytelling.
With the holidays, I actually reviewed book 4(From These Ashes) first but I did listen to the series in order. Snow still completely blows me away, Christopher is an awesome blending of hard ass and soft hugs. I guess that's what makes Snow and Christopher work so well, they compliment each other, they keep the other in check(or they try their hardest to do so😉).
As for the narration, well like I said in book 4, I've never listened to a book with dual narrators before but they worked perfectly. When I first started listening I thought Snow came across as jumpier, a little out of sync but the more I listened the more I realized that it was the perfect way to bring Snow's upbeat and snarky character to life. Could other narrators pull it off? Sure, but after hearing Joel Leslie and Philip Alces, I can't imagine anyone else bringing Haven Hart alive.
Original ebook Review December 2017:
When Snow comes upon a little boy in trouble and comes to his aid, he has no plans for it to lead to a new beginning he was just doing what he felt was right. Christopher may be the head of a family that has some questionable tactics but he is an honorable man so when his nephew is saved by a young man in an alley, he offers the man a job. Will either man let the future take root and grow or will their secrets get in the way?
Snow Falling is a masterpiece! That is the best way to explain what I read, nothing more, nothing less. It is a true masterpiece, a gem to be savored. When you factor in that this is a debut novel by the author, well frankly its hard to believe because its just so great. Now, I would be lying if I said I am unfamiliar with the author because I consider her a friend and kindred spirit and I have been cheering her on for several years. I knew her book would be good but even I was overwhelmed at how stunning and heartwarming Snow Falling is.
The characters, from Snow and Christopher to Roy and Bill to Lisa and Maggie, they all bring something to the story and not a single one is "window dressing" or "filler", they all have a part to play in the journey that is found within the covers of Snow Falling. I mention that because that is a rare thing, in my experience there is usually at least one character that could have been removed from the pages and the reader would not miss them but not here. Every character is intriguing in their own way and makes the story better.
As you know, I don't do spoilers so all I'll say in regards to the plot is WOW because I was hooked and had everyday life not got in the way I would have easily read this in one sitting. Talk about an easy read, and don't think I mean "easy" as in simple and short. No, I mean "easy" as in it grabs you from the first page and before you know it half the book is gone and then suddenly you find yourself at the epilogue. I started this review by saying Snow Falling is a masterpiece and I'll end with saying it has heart, no better way to say it: Snow Falling will break your heart, but it will also warm your heart.
The Mystery of the Moving Image by CS Poe
Original Review September 2018:
When Sebastian Snow receives one of the most unigue items he probably has ever seen, a working kenitiscope with a film reel he is completely confused as there is no information who sent it or why. Upon viewing the film he sees something he never thought possible, footage of a live murder from over 100 years ago. Can Calvin help him solve the century old murder and will solving Seb's case lead to solving the murders happening since receiving the film?
I didn't think it possible but I loved The Mystery of the Moving Image even more than the first two in the Snow & Winter series. Perhaps it's the movie lover in me that felt more connected to this one. Whatever the reason, Moving Image is brilliant! Intriguing, interesting, unique, and once again fun. That's right, CS Poe has made antiquing and murder fun😉😉
I won't say anything more about the plot and as far as Seb and Calvin's relationship goes I love how they keep moving forward. Calvin knows that Seb probably won't listen to him when he tells him to stay out of it and although this probably frustrates him he just takes a deep breath and does what he can to minimize the fallout. They balance each other out in so many ways.
As I just found this series I was able to read them one right after the other but I fear now that I will have to wait a while for the next installment but I know it will be well worth it and I eagerly await the wonders that Seb finds at his door next. I suppose technically each book is a standalone as the mystery begins and ends within the covers but I highly recommend reading them in order as the relationship between Seb and Calvin grows and there are minor mentions to the previous cases.
Anarchy by Olivier Bosman
Original ebook Review July 2019:
Anarchists, terrorist, or something more personal? When the missing Hirsch brothers keep turning up dead suddenly a case of anarchy is looking much more personal. Once again Olivier Bosman throws DS Billings headlong into a case that goes horribly wrong. Has he taken one too many wrong turns finally? For that you have to read yourself but trust me, it is well worth the time to find out.
I absolutely love this series, there is something about Billings that you just want to wrap the poor guy in a bear hug but it's going to take more than that to keep him safe. On the personal side, he's finally opening his heart up to his true nature, reluctantly but still more than he ever has before. Will he find happiness now that he's exploring his heart? You have to read that for yourself but I love how each entry brings him into himself more and perhaps not "risk" the consequences but he's not letting the fear completely shut him off from his heart.
As much of a history lover that I am, I have to admit 1890s England is not my area of knowledge short of what I've seen in films and read in fiction which I know is not always an accurate portrayal of the time. For that reason, I can't say with 100% certainty to the author's stick-to-it-ness of the era but I'm going to guess it is pretty real from what little I do know and that makes Anarchy even better.
The mystery, the romance, the history, all of these aspects makes Anarchy a great read and another great installment to the DS Billings Victorian Mysteries series. If you are new to this series I highly recommend reading it in order. Yes, each entry has a new case but as I already touched on DS Billings grows into accepting himself more and more with each book. The friction between him and his superior, the friendship between him and his partner, all these things continue from one case to the next making the personal side of each book flow better having read the previous ones. After the ending of Anarchy I can't help but fear Billings may suffer a few setbacks but then again it might serve as the kick-in-the-pants he needs to show him what's important. Either way I can't wait to see where Olivier Bosman takes his character next.
Two Feet Under by Charlie Cochrane
Original Review February 2018:
Adam Matthews and Robin Bright keep moving forward with their relationship and maintaining their homelife with beloved guard dog, Campbell. Now as they push forward with new positions in the workplace everything is looking up so what could go wrong? A spot of murder and an unexpected houseguest is what they face, throw in identiyfing Jane Doe, smug suspects, and a police leak to the media and the boys learn that maybe murder and mayhem will always find them.
I just want to start out by saying how much I love Adam and Robin, perhaps not as much as the author's other crime solving duo: Jonty and Orlando, but it's a pretty tight race. There is just something about Adam and Robin that makes me smile, maybe its their banter, their chemistry, or maybe its how the author makes them so real. Granted, most couples(no matter their occupation) don't find themselves in situations of repeated chaos like these boys but beyond that they come across as people you would meet filling the car with gas or picking up your weekly shopping. Whether the author meant for the reader to find this connection to the boys or its just a happy coincidence it still shows the talent and knack she has in bringing her characters to life. Speaking of chemistry, something that really showed it for me was their use of "Don't forget the milk" to convey "I love you". Not all couples say the actual "L-word" but they express it a thousand other ways and for me this was just another example of how Miss Cochrane make the boys more real.
Now, as for the mystery you know I won't reveal any spoilers and when it comes to this genre every little tidbit and snippet can be a huge clue so I really won't touch on the plot at all other than to say its brilliant. On a personal note, I really enjoyed how the author threw references to Midsomer Murders into a few scenes. Midsomer is my absolute favorite mystery series of all time(a little secret between you and me: I own all 19 seasons on DVD and have most of them nearly memorized😉). There is just something about the British, the UK as a whole really, and their way with murder, mayhem, and intrigue that sets them above the rest. I enjoy American mysteries but given the choice I can honestly say that I will pick a UK mystery over one of ours every time. I said all this because Two Feet Under is a perfect example of why I love mysteries from across the pond and the best way to explain my feelings without plot spoiling.
So, if you have already experienced The Best Corpse for the Job and Jury of One, than you know how lovely the author brings life to Adam and Robin. If you are new to this series than now is a great time to give it a looksee. Technically, yes each installment is a standalone as the mystery begins and ends within the pages of each book but personally, I can't imagine not reading Lindenshaw Mysteries in order. Between character development and references to previous cases it just flows better read 1,2, and 3 but no, I don't suppose it is a must. Those looking for detailed spicy-ness will probably be a bit disappointed but don't think that means that there is no passion and heat, it's just the author leaves these moments more to the reader's imagination and trust me I can imagine quite a bit 😉😉 So, grab a copy, buckle down, snuggle in and begin.
A Party to Murder by John Inman
Original Review July 2019:
John Inman has done it again! I've said it before and I'll say it again(and I'm sure it won't be the last time you'll hear me say it) the man knows how to bring danger, death, and destruction to the page and he manages to keep it fun and romantic too, its the whole package. Longtime friends have recently become friends with benefits who most likely both want more but haven't voiced it yet, receive invitations to a party in the woods from an unfamiliar name but decide to go because it sounds like a laugh, it's a stormy night in the middle of nowhere . . . what could go wrong? Practically everything.
So A Party to Murder sounds like a setup that has been done by many authors and Hollywood directors alike but John Inman makes it original with his own quirky blend of darkness, romance, mystery, and heat that keeps you on the edge of your seat. In a way it reads as a homage to Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None, Dashiell Hammet's The Thin Man, and any number of 80s horror flicks. You've got a cast of characters that keep dwindling, a dark and trapped setting, and then there is Derek and Jamie who may not be Nick and Nora Charles but their banter and obvious devotion to each other couldn't help but remind me of the chemistry the Charles' share.
Obviously I won't speak to the mystery aspect other than Party may not have had me fooled all the way up until the reveal but it didn't matter. Just because I suspected the who, it was the why that kept me on pins and needles. Just because my guess ended up being the who, doesn't mean I wasn't left wondering "am I right?" and on more than one occasion I found myself "or could it be ??? making this even more disturbing?" so just because you think you know, you really never truly know when it comes to John Inman.
As for Jamie and Derek, the friends with benefits, I think we all know they both want to be more than friends with benefits but its whether or not they'll open up to each other that gives A Party to Murder the romantic element. Some might think its not very believable that two people can find time for love when their fellow party guests are dropping like mayflies but what better time to be honest with your heart than when facing possible death? Not knowing if you'll be walking away is the perfect time to be true to one's heart. I loved their oddities that make them a perfect pair.
Throw in a cast of characters who don't know each other, who don't know the invitation sender, who have never been to the property, and what you have is a story that will keep you hooked from beginning to end. John Inman knows how to set the scene to make the reader feel as if they too got a mystery invitation to the creepy mansion in the woods and why it is perfectly understandable that Jamie, Derek, and everyone else on the fateful guest list would accept such an invite. A Party to Murder is definitely a win-win for mystery lovers, quirky lovers, romance lovers, heck its a win-win for any lover of good storytelling.
RATING:
Snow Falling by Davidson King
I should have known I wouldn’t get far. Frank grabbed my arm. “He’s not my kid. His pop will very much want to speak with you. Something tells me if you walk out that door, you’ll disappear, and I don’t have time to go lookin’ for you. So, I think you’ll come with us for now.” His firm tone made it clear it wasn’t a question.
When I looked around the police station, I was shocked that no cops were interfering in what was clearly a kidnapping. I shouldn’t have been too surprised. After all, in my book, police didn’t have a very good track record for doing what was right.
“Stranger danger!” I yelled, which just made Simon laugh.
“No, Snow, we aren’t strangers anymore. You come home and my pop will protect you. That’s what he does.”
Who the hell was his pop? Surviving was a lot about picking your battles. Looking around the precinct, it was obvious my choices weren’t going to win out. Frank and his goons weren’t going to let me pass. On the off chance I got away, then I’d have Roy and these guys chasing me.
“I don’t think I have a choice, do I?” Frank shook his head. “Okay then. Onward, my good man!”
If the limo wasn’t a huge giveaway that Simon’s pop was disgustingly rich, the enormous mansion with the iron gate was. Two large Ms were worked into the iron. The house had a medieval look about it. A fountain of fear was on display in the middle of the circular driveway, some sort of gargoyles spitting water out of their mouths… or was it their eyes? Gray stone, iron, and darkness made up this house. Whoever this guy was, he wasn’t just rich, he was powerful. Leaning over, I whispered in Simon’s ear, “Is your pop Tony Stark?”
Simon chuckled. “No silly, he’s Christopher Manos.”
Christopher Manos? Oh, son of a bitch. At least Iron Man was on the right side of justice.
“Come on, Snow, you can meet my pop!” Simon grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the limo with all his might. When we came to the stone steps and I looked up, I came face to face with not only the most dangerous man in this city, but the most gorgeous. He was broad, and I could see the muscles in his arms and legs even through his expensive suit. He had midnight black hair and obsidian eyes. There was no doubt he and Simon were related.
“Pop!” Simon ran into his arms. The man didn’t miss a beat. He scooped Simon up without ever taking his eyes off me. “That’s Snow. He saved me.”
“Mr. Manos, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’ll have you know, I didn’t want to come here. I was forced. You have a beautiful home and a great kid and if you just let me go, I’ll happily walk home.”
He stared at me coldly. “You don’t know my home is beautiful, you haven’t seen it. Let’s rectify that. Come in.” He turned and walked inside. The nudge from Frank was likely the only encouragement I’d get.
I hope I don’t die.
The Mystery of the Moving Image by CS Poe
IF THERE was one thing I’d taken away from the last six months of murder and mystery, it was to expect the unexpected.
Max Ridley and I stared at a four-foot-tall wooden crate that had been delivered to the Emporium that morning. Neither of us had spoken for a good minute.
“Five bucks says there’s a dead body inside,” he finally said.
I shook my head. “We’d smell decomp.”
“A normal person wouldn’t say that,” he replied, not looking away from the box.
“Normal is relative.”
“Let’s not get into a philosophical debate before 10:00 a.m.”
I took a step forward and snatched the shipping label from the plastic envelope slapped on the front of the crate. I unfolded it and held my magnifying glass up to the small print.
“Who’s it from?” Max asked.
“I’m not sure.”
“Should I call 911?”
I glanced up. “The last time we did that, they sent a vigilante who tried to kill me.”
“That’s true.” Max held up his cell. “But I know three cops and an FBI agent by proxy, so we have options.”
“Calm down.”
“I don’t trust mystery packages, Seb. Not anymore.”
I looked at the label again. “It came from a shipping company on the Upper East Side.”
“But no name?”
“No.”
“Is it addressed to you?”
“Owner,” I clarified.
“I’m calling the cops.”
I looked at Max, reached out, and put my hand over his cell. “Calvin probably just ordered something for the apartment.”
Ah yes, that had been one bit of good to come out of losing my home to an explosion back in February. It’d taken just over two months of searching and Realtor harassing, but as of yesterday, Snow and Winter were the new tenants of 4B—a loft apartment in the East Village above a coffee shop and hippy-dippy clothing store. And despite the insurmountable odds, I was able to tick off every single one of my neurotic must-haves and still keep to a rent that wouldn’t bleed me and Calvin dry. I mean, it was by far more expensive than my old, cozy, rent-controlled place, but seeing as how I was putting my name on the bills with a guy I liked a lot—yeah. Seemed worth the extra cash.
“Call him and ask,” Max replied.
“He’s busy with manly stuff,” I answered.
“What?”
“Unpacking, lifting heavy things, inserting tabs into slots….”
“I’ll quit.”
“Jesus, Max—”
“Just call him.”
I let out an annoyed huff, took my phone from my back pocket, pulled Calvin up in the recent contacts, and called.
“Hey, baby,” Calvin answered.
“Hey,” I said. “Got a second?”
“For you? Several.”
“Aren’t you cute.”
Calvin laughed. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah. I just had a package delivered here at the Emporium and was wondering if you’d ordered something big—like, a chandelier—for the apartment?”
“And had it shipped there?” he asked, sounding unsure.
“Uh-huh.”
“No.”
I frowned and glanced sideways at Max. “I’ve got a four-foot-tall mystery box in the middle of my showroom.”
“Since when has that ever stopped you, Hercule?”
I smiled a little. “Ohhh….”
“Like that?” Calvin asked.
“I do.”
“I knew you would.”
I laughed, much to Max’s displeasure. “Figured I’d check in with you before cracking it open. I tend to get a lot of junk this way. People cleaning out grandma’s attic ship me garbage and say ‘keep it until it sells,’ like I’m a warehouse.”
“No return address, then?” Calvin asked, and in the background, I could hear tape being torn off a cardboard box. I’d offered to close the Emporium to help him finish unpacking the apartment, but he’d politely kissed my forehead and shoved me out the front door that morning.
“Some shipping and supply office way the hell uptown.”
“Huh.”
“Were you expecting a housewarming gift?” I tried. Not that anyone in Calvin’s family even knew we’d moved in together. They’d completely stopped talking to him at Christmastime when he’d come out—the exception being Calvin’s Uncle Nelson. Nelson was a sweet old guy. I’d said hello on the phone a few times. He was nothing like the impression I had of Calvin’s father, a retired military man who hated me on principle alone.
“No,” Calvin answered.
“I’m going to tear into this crate.”
“Don’t let me stop you.”
“I’ll see you tonight,” I said.
“I’ll be the big sweaty guy in the house,” Calvin replied.
“I love when you’re sweaty.”
“Boss,” Max interrupted, and I swear I could hear his eye-roll.
Calvin was laughing over the line. “Bye, sweetheart.”
“Bye.” I stuffed my phone into my pocket.
“When’s the honeymoon?”
“Stop it,” I muttered.
“It’s not Calvin’s, then?” Max asked.
I shook my head. “Nope. Would you grab a hammer from the office?”
“All right,” he answered a bit reluctantly. Max left my side, hiked up the stairs, went past the register, and disappeared into my closet-sized office. “But if there’s anything inside that’s dead, dying, or threatening to kill either of us, I’m burning this place to the ground because it’s totally cursed.”
“I’m not sure whether you’re trying to save me or screw me over,” I said, mostly to myself, but Max heard me.
“Saving you, believe me,” he replied. He jumped off the stairs and approached with the hammer. “Move aside.”
“You want to open it?”
“Maybe if I’m the one to do it, it’ll negate any potential chaos that would otherwise befall you.”
“You’re so sweet.” I took a step back and crossed my arms.
“Is that guy from the Javits Center’s Antique Fair still coming by today?” Max asked as he stuck the back of the hammer under the wooden lid and pushed down on the handle. The nails squeaked loudly as they were pulled free.
“He’s supposed to.”
“He was supposed to on Saturday.”
“And Sunday,” I clarified. “Then I canceled yesterday so I could move. If he doesn’t come today to pick up my items for the show, they can kiss my ass next year when they’re looking for sponsorship money.”
“Seriously.” Max laughed, then moved the hammer and hoisted the lid once more. “So how’s the new place?” He glanced over his shoulder at me.
I winced as more nails screeched free from the wood. “Good. I’m hoping our bed will be delivered today. Spent last night on the living room floor.”
“At least you had a hunky ginger to keep you company.”
“Very true.”
There’d been a lot of change in my life as of late. Mostly for the good, of course.
Business was going great, despite the seemingly bad luck the Emporium had in terms of being a target in the Nevermore and Curiosities cases—but we’d all escaped those with our heads still attached. And after a long line of bad-for-me boyfriends, I’d just moved in with a guy who was my soul mate. Friends and family were healthy, happy—I was even a pet owner now.
So yeah, a lot of things were good.
But I guess that’s why I’d also been sidelined by anxieties lately. I wasn’t expecting old self-doubts when I was on top of the world.
Like, one too many of Calvin’s compliments had gone to my head, and when my clothes had been torched in the fire, I’d purchased a new wardrobe for the first time in… at least a decade. No more secondhand crap. I now owned formfitting, colored clothes. I thought they’d finally give a boost of confidence to my appearance, an insecurity I usually hid with self-deprecating humor, except it’d turned out to be nothing but dread since day one.
And I knew how… stupid it must have sounded. But until someone has been intensely uncomfortable in their clothes, I didn’t think people realized just how much a wardrobe could make or break them. Yeah, the secondhand shit didn’t fit, was old and worn-out, but it was safe. I didn’t need to check a color wheel before putting something on. I disappeared into a crowd. Now every morning was approached with a certain level of trepidation. Were people staring because I clashed and was an eyesore? Were they staring because I wasn’t the best-looking guy and these clothes made me stand out when I used to blend in? They must wonder what Calvin was doing slumming with a guy like me.
Of course I hadn’t said any of this out loud.
Hell would sooner freeze over.
Max lifted the top from the crate, set it on the floor, then peered inside. “Lots of padding. Looks like a piece of furniture.”
I took a few steps forward to see for myself. Wedged between the object and the crate wall was a smaller wrapped item. I tugged it free. “Pull the front of the crate off, will you? We can’t lift that out.”
“Sure thing.” Max took the hammer and went at more of the nails.
I set the smaller item down on a nearby display table and carefully removed the bubble wrap. Nestled within was a round metal canister. I carefully picked it up. There was weight to it.
“You know,” Max said, around the tearing of wooden planks. “If we go through all this and it’s some fugly television from the 1950s….”
I stared at the canister for another moment. “Not a television,” I murmured.
“What?” Max tore off another piece of wood.
“It’s not a TV,” I said again, turning to look at him.
He glanced at the crate and motioned to the item within. “It’s hard to see through the wrapping, but it looks like one of those with the built-in cabinet.”
I walked back to the crate, reached inside, and yanked away the padding. “This is—” I caught myself from finishing, almost like I didn’t want to jinx it. I tore out layer after layer of careful packaging, revealing a spectacularly well-preserved cabinet. “Jesus Christ,” I swore.
“What is it?”
“A Kinetoscope.”
“A what-o-scope?”
“Kinetoscope. A one-person movie viewer, patented by Thomas Edison,” I said, looking at Max. “This was before they’d figured out how to project a moving image to a large audience.” I leaned into the crate and pointed. “See here, you look through the peephole on top. There’s a bulb inside that backlights the frames, and the film is spooled through the cabinet.”
“It’s original?” Max asked.
I rubbed my bristly chin and stared hard. “I think so. Help me pull it out. And for the love of God—”
“Be careful,” Max finished for me.
“The Kinetoscope wasn’t around very long,” I said as we walked the cabinet out of the crate. “As the film industry grew, inventions became obsolete fairly quickly.”
“How did these work, though?” Max asked. “I mean, people didn’t have them in homes, right?”
“Oh no. You’d go to a Kinetoscope parlor. There used to be one here in New York, you know. Taking inflation into account, Edison was charging the parlors somewhere around six hundred dollars for the reel of film.”
“Hell of a businessman.” Max began picking up the mess once we’d gotten the Kinetoscope situated in an empty space of showroom floor. “What was in the little package?”
“A film reel,” I said, hands on my hips as I made a slow circuit around the case.
“Really?” he asked excitedly.
“Niche market makes this difficult to price. It’d be the historical value—”
“Seb. Home movie. Focus.”
I glanced up. “What about it?”
Max made exaggerated gestures at where I’d left the canister. “Let’s see what’s on it.”
I dropped my hands from my hips and went to the table. “I doubt it’s in any sort of salvageable condition.”
“Why do you say that?” he asked, going to the register counter and retrieving a pair of cloth gloves.
“Films simply weren’t well preserved back then. Acid ate away at the celluloid. Sometimes there were studio fires, or old reels were just destroyed. They had no intrinsic value at the time,” I explained.
Max offered the gloves as he joined me.
I put them on. “This would have also been before silent film stars like Charlie Chaplin or Harold Lloyd began protecting their work.” I picked up the canister again and held it close, studying the front and back side.
Max leaned against the table and crossed his arms lightly. “I remember watching Fred Ott’s Sneeze in my Film History class. That was Edison’s, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, first copyrighted film in the United States,” I murmured. Fred Ott had been a gentleman who worked for Edison, who by all accounts had a particularly memorable sneeze. It was one of the test reels shot by W. K. L. Dickson, Edison’s assistant, who was the brilliant inventor of the Kinetograph camera and Scope viewer. “But even that film didn’t survive,” I continued. “It was submitted to the Library of Congress as a series of still images, later reanimated into a movie.”
“How do you know this?”
“I took notes in college.” I carefully removed the canister lid.
“You’re the guy at the cocktail party everyone regrets striking up a conversation with.”
“Yeah, probably.” I set the lid aside and stared at the spool of film. It looked… okay. Better than okay. Intact. Playable, even. “This is incredible. Look here—it has the perforations along the side of the frames.”
Max leaned close, reached out, and hovered his finger above the strip of film I held. “So, what, those holes feed in the Kinetoscope, right?”
“Right. Edison patented that concept as well, but it was Dickson who came up with the idea to slice 70mm film in half and make perforations. Afterward, the company was able to submit custom orders for film stock with these exact specifications for their machines.”
“Hundred-twenty-year-old movie,” Max said with an astonished tone. “It’s going to be either porn or cats.”
I laughed and took the film canister with me to the Kinetoscope. I stooped, opened the cabinet, and studied the mechanical setup.
“Are you going to try to play the film?”
“Sure.” I looked back at Max. “You want to see what it is, right?”
“Duh.”
We sat in front of the Kinetoscope, studying old patent schematics I brought up on my phone, and tried to duplicate the arrangement with our mystery film stock. After about twenty minutes of “Be careful,” “No, the other way,” “The other, other way,” and the classic, “Oh shit,” we got it fed through the long system of spools.
Max was tearing through the crate’s packaging once again.
“What’re you doing?” I called, carefully shutting the cabinet.
“Looking for a note.”
“Is there one?”
“No.” More shuffling followed, and then Max peered down over the top of the cabinet at me. “This has to be from someone you know, don’t you think?”
“Why do you say that?”
“Trusting you with such a rare artifact.”
“I do love a good ego stroke,” I muttered before getting to my feet.
“Not to mention that shipping a crate is expensive, even if it’s just from one end of the city to the other,” Max concluded. The shop phone rang and he left my side to answer it.
“I’ll call the shipping company today,” I said, mostly to myself once Max started talking on the phone. “See if they can provide me with the client’s contact information….”
“Boss,” Max said. He wove in between displays, reaching the phone out. “It’s Pete-Ain’t-Never-Gonna-Show from the fair.”
My shoulders dropped a bit. I took the phone. “Pete?”
“Hey! Snow! I got your message about the pickup.”
I pursed my lips. “I left that message on Sunday. It’s Tuesday.”
“Well, yeah, but you weren’t open yesterday.”
“You were supposed to be here on Saturday, Pete. I’ve had my stock for the fair boxed and waiting since last Friday.”
“Look, I’m sorry about missing the pickup window, but it’s been a busy week of prepping for the event. We welcome our sponsors to drop items off at the Javits Center themselves.”
“I don’t drive,” I replied. “And I shouldn’t have to trek to the ass-end of Hell’s Kitchen myself when I’m paying a sponsorship level that includes the pickup and delivery of all inventory on display for the fair.”
Max winced, I think on Pete’s behalf.
The antiquing community didn’t have a lot of thirty-three-year-olds in it. And there were some members who didn’t enjoy taking a young’un like me seriously. Most had no idea how hard I’d worked to get where I was in the business.
I’d gone into debt to obtain an MFA and put in several years as a sort-of apprentice under one of the biggest assholes in the industry, my late boss Mike Rodriguez. I took pride in my shop and had labored for three years to cultivate and bring attention to obscure relics of our past. Now, my clients returned time and again because they knew the knowledge, inventory, and attention to detail they’d receive from me was top-notch. Snow’s Antique Emporium has since become the sort of business that the Javits Antique Fair reaches out to, requesting I sponsor their event.
So I might have been one of the younger members of the community, but God save the poor bastard who took my hard-earned money and didn’t meet my expectations in return.
“I’m coming by today,” Pete answered, sounding rather unfazed by my agitation.
“The fair opens tomorrow.”
“And that’s why I’m coming today,” he reiterated, like I was the dense one.
The bell above the Emporium’s door chimed. Max and I both turned to see Beth Harrison standing in the open doorway. She was my business neighbor and the owner of Good Books, was about Pop’s age, and had long ago lost her last fuck to give.
“Good morning!” she declared, walking toward us with something in her hands.
“When will you be here?” I asked Pete as Max left me in favor of Beth.
“Oh… should be between eleven and… threeish?”
“Traffic across town must be a real bitch,” I answered, deadpan.
“You’ll be there when I stop in, right?”
“Unfortunately.”
“Good. I’ll need you to sign a few forms.”
“Fine.”
“Will you be at the fair tomorrow?” Pete asked next.
I looked up. Beth was giving me a curious expression. Max was staring at his phone. “Let’s just focus on today first, shall we?” I muttered a goodbye and ended the call.
Beth walked forward. “Someone’s got his grumpy pants on this morning.”
“I’m actually in a good mood,” I corrected. “That was Pete White from the fair. He was supposed to be here four days ago to pick up my collection for the show.”
“How professional,” she said sarcastically.
Max raised his head and turned his phone to show me the screen, even though I was too far away to make out the image. “Marshall’s Oddities is a sponsor, and he’s already set up at the Center.”
Marshall’s Oddities, owned and operated by copycat Greg Thompson, was my only real competition in the city. I said “competition” because he’d basically stolen my shop’s image of “curious and bizarre” and still tried to pilfer my customers whenever possible. I was more than happy to supply the names of fellow dealers to my clients if there’s something they want outside my wheelhouse, because in turn those businesses sent customers to me. But not Greg. He’d never once scratched my back.
Frankly, I didn’t want him to. Or trust him to.
We did not get along, and I was okay with that being the entirety of our relationship. Although… it might also be partly due to the fact that last December I suspected Greg was the nutjob behind the Nevermore murders. But hey. Honest mistake.
“How’d you find that out?” I asked.
“Facebook.”
I grunted.
Max put his phone away.
Beth held up the plate in her hands. “So… how’re you boys on this fine May morning?”
“Why are you so chipper?” Max asked. “You’re talking like a fairy godmother.”
Beth snorted. “I am not. You’ve just spent too much time around your boss, whose good moods resemble most people’s bad moods.”
“They do not,” I grumbled.
“Be nice,” she responded. “I’ve got cookies.”
“Were you going to share?” I asked. “Or were you just taking them for a walk?”
“I don’t know why the hell I put up with you sometimes, Sebby.” Beth handed me the plate. “I come bearing gifts and you give me sass.”
“It’s my default setting,” I replied. I picked up a cookie and took a bite.
“Well, you’d better watch it,” Beth continued, “or that’s the last cookie I share with you.”
I held the plate out of reach. “No take backs,” I said around a full mouth.
Beth was always complaining that customers were stealing her pens. I noted she had three or four stuffed into her bun that morning but decided to let her find those on her own. She was wearing a feline-inspired top, although subtle today—just a cat nose and whiskers—but she also wore leggings with creatures on them that looked half-taco, half-cat, so… a typical wardrobe day for Beth.
“Are you dating a mechanic?” I asked, pointing at her clunky boots.
Beth looked down briefly. “My cat barfed in my Birkenstocks this morning.”
“Charming,” I answered.
Beth put her hands on her hips and walked toward the Kinetoscope. “What have you got here?”
“This is a whatchamacallit,” Max said, pointing at the cabinet.
“A what?” Beth asked.
“Kinetoscope,” I said around the final bite of cookie.
“What does it do?”
“It’s a one-person movie viewer,” Max answered, parroting my explanations back to Beth. “It even came with a 120-year-old film.”
“You don’t say?”
“My money is on porn or cats,” he continued.
“I like those odds,” she agreed.
I set the plate on a nearby table and wiped crumbs from the front of my sweater-vest.
“Sebby.”
I looked up. “Seb, Beth. Seb.”
She ignored me. “You look so handsome in green.”
“I thought this was blue.”
She and Max shook their heads.
“Christ,” I muttered to myself, looking back down.
“Seb was about to turn the Kinetoscope on,” Max said, almost like he’d caught my it’s-not-blue anxiety and changed the subject. “Want to stay for the big unveiling?”
Beth clapped her hands together. “Oh yes! Let’s see what you have.”
I stepped back to the cabinet and gave the Kinetoscope a final once-over before daring to power it on for what might have been the first time in over a hundred years. But against all odds, the machine came to life, the wheels inside making sound as the film was set into a continuous loop. I moved around to the front and glanced in the peephole. The bulb illuminating the projected stills was bright, and I had to squint as I watched.
It turned out the mystery footage wasn’t Victorian porn or cats, but instead, a boxing match. And one I recognized, at that.
The Leonard-Cushing fight of 1894. It was sold by Edison as an authentic fight, but the truth was, it was staged and filmed at his studio, Black Maria, in Jersey. Regardless, it was the first boxing match to be recorded, and of the six reels that were once for sale to the Kinetoscope parlors, less than a full round still existed today. The knockout footage—naturally the most popular round with customers—hadn’t survived.
At least, it hadn’t thirty seconds ago.
Because I was watching it now.
Leonard won. I knew he would, but no one in modern times had ever seen it.
I opened my mouth to say… something, but there was a weird blip in the film, some distortion, and then the scene was different. It was outdoors, the image dark and grainy. Some odd lighting, just above two figures in the scene, illuminated a street that otherwise would have been engulfed in nighttime. The figures appeared to be men—neither from the prior boxing scene. One had very distinctive muttonchops and a bit of a gut. The second man was pretty nondescript. They seemed to be arguing, but the frame rate the movie had been shot at was different from what was used today, making their motions quick and dramatic-looking, so it was hard to tell.
Without warning, Muttonchops pulled something from inside his coat, and the motion blurred as he lunged. Nondescript Man held his neck and then crumpled to the ground. Muttonchops stared down at him for a few seconds, dropped whatever he had been holding, and ran.
The scene looped and brought me back to the fight.
“So?” Max asked excitedly.
I raised my head, looking at him and Beth. “I… think I just witnessed a murder.”
Two Feet Under by Charlie Cochrane
Chapter One
“And this is our safeguarding checklist. If you’ll just sign it to show you’ve read it and agree to abide by it . . .”
Adam nodded, read the sheet of paper, then signed and dated it at the bottom.
Adam Matthews, deputy headteacher. 10th April.
He fancied writing the job title again, as it had felt so good the first time. His first deputy headship, and a real chance to put a feather in his cap, given that Culdover Church of England Primary School officially “required improvement.” He’d been recruited to help the new headteacher light such a firework under the staff that by the next time the Ofsted inspectors popped their cheery heads round the door, they’d rate the school as at least “good.”
Before any of that could happen, though, he’d have to go through the standard induction procedure, almost all of it necessary, some of it boring, and some elements—like safeguarding and the location of the men’s toilets—vital.
Soon everything was done and he had the chance to familiarise himself with the place, including sitting in with his year-six class, which he’d be taking two days a week and who were at present under the beady eye of Mrs. Daniel, the teacher who’d have them the other three days. The pupils seemed a cheery enough bunch, eager to show their new deputy just how good they were at maths. He sat down at one of the tables, where they were mulling over fractions, although it wasn’t long before they wanted to bombard him with questions, a new member of staff—and that rare thing in primary education, a man—being much more interesting than halves and quarters. In the end, Adam, Mrs. Daniel, and the pupils came to the arrangement of making the last five minutes of the lesson a question-and-answer session, in return for which the children would work like billy-o up to that point. The plan worked.
“Which team do you support, sir?” opened the official interrogation.
“Saracens for rugby. Abbotston for football.”
“Are you married, sir?”
“No.” Until he had an idea of how mature his class were, he’d better keep quiet about the exact nature of his relationship. “But I’ve got a Newfoundland dog called Campbell.”
“Wow! Will you bring in a picture of him?”
“Of course. I’ll put it on the desk so he can keep an eye on you all.” One day perhaps he’d also be able to bring a picture of Robin in to show the class, but that was probably wishful thinking. Children had open minds, yet too often they got filled with an imitation of their parents’ prejudices.
“I interviewed you, sir,” one spiky-haired lad piped up.
“I remember.” The school-council part of the interview process had been trickier than facing the headteacher and governors. “You asked me to sing a song.”
“Yeah. And you made us sing one instead.” The boy chortled, his classmates joining in.
“I remember. No point in getting old if you can’t get cunning.” Adam grinned. “Right, one last question.”
One of the girls—with an expression more serious than normally came with her age—raised her hand among a sea of others. She waited for Adam’s nod before asking, “Which school did you used to teach at?”
Adam forced his grin to keep going. “Lindenshaw. Lindenshaw St. Crispin’s, to give it its full name.”
“Oh.” The girl turned pale. “My dad told me they had a murder there. Is that why you left?”
Adam paused. So the school’s reputation was preceding it?
Mrs. Daniel, obviously flustered, said, “I don’t think we should talk about things like that.”
Adam pursed his lips. “I think I disagree. It’s better to have stuff in the open, and I’d have hoped this class is mature enough to discuss matters like that sensibly.” How best to describe what had happened? Simply stating that there’d been a murder in what had been the children’s kitchen, where the pupils had once learned to make semi-inedible fairy cakes, might put these pupils off cookery for life. “Somebody was killed, which is a really rare thing to happen in a school. None of the children were ever at risk, and the police found the killer very quickly.”
And he’d found a partner in the process, which had been the best outcome from a wretched time.
The spiky-haired lad chipped in again. “My dad says that you probably can’t go anywhere in Culdover without walking over a place where someone’s died. What with the Romans and the air raids and—”
Adam raised a hand. “I think that’s where we’ll leave it. Time for lunch.”
The class left their chairs, lined up at the door, and waited for Mrs. Daniel to let them out to their pre-lunch play. Just another first day of term for the children at Culdover, but for Adam it was that cliché: “the first day of the rest of his life.” He’d miss Lindenshaw school—that went without saying, especially as it was starting to show a real improvement under the new headteacher—but his regrets would be few. The place held far too many unpleasant memories and associations now, and not simply in terms of the murder. Just last term a young teacher had thrown away the chances of a good career because he couldn’t keep his fists to himself.
Worst of all, but predating Adam’s sojourn at Lindenshaw, it had been Robin’s school, where he’d been subjected to continual bullying.
Adam had promised to keep in touch with those of his colleagues who’d become genuine friends, but the building itself . . . The sooner Adam could shake the dust of the place off his shoes, the better.
He decided to spend his lunchtime mingling in the Culdover staffroom, getting into the normal school routine as soon as possible, then he’d give Robin a quick bell, and he wouldn’t need to wander a quarter of a mile to do so. Another thing he wouldn’t miss about Lindenshaw school was the mobile-phone black spot it sat in, which made reception a hit-or-miss affair unless you braved the women’s toilets, where the signal was said to be perfect. Adam had always opted for the quarter-mile walk.
“How’s it going?” Robin said when Adam had done his mingling and reported in.
“Much as expected.” What was there to say about a typical first morning? “Friendly place, good team, interesting pupils.”
Robin sniggered. “Interesting as in potential psychopaths?”
“Do you think of everyone as a potential criminal?”
“Only if they come from Culdover.”
“Don’t let them hear you say that.” Culdover was a typically English small town, one that had been distinctly posh in its heyday although it had gone downhill post-war, and parts of it were looking rather ropey. Regeneration had made a difference in some places, but the preponderance of charity shops on the high street showed there was plenty still to do. “Busy today?”
“Usual sort of stuff. Spate of upmarket car thefts. Case of dognapping too. I won’t tell Campbell.”
“Make sure you don’t. He’ll have nightmares.” At work one of them may report to a headteacher and the other to a chief superintendent, but at home the roost was ruled by a large, black, wet-nosed Newfoundland dog, whose self-estimation had been swelled by his having saved both of his masters’ lives on separate occasions.
“Got to go. Villains to nick. See you tonight.”
“Yeah. Don’t forget the milk.”
“I won’t.”
Adam smiled. Their house was well stocked with semi-skimmed, but “don’t forget the milk” and its response “I won’t,” or some slight variation on them, had become code for “I love you” and “I love you too,” which couldn’t always be used. Even if Robin and Adam were no longer in the closet, sometimes common sense had to prevail.
Robin ended the call, finished his sandwich, and got back to his paperwork. He glanced up at the clock, only to find that it wasn’t where he’d expected. How long was it going to take him to get used to this new office and new location?
Abbotston nick wasn’t proving so bad in the wake of chucking out the rotten apples. It was better still, Robin believed, now that he was the acting chief inspector with every prospect of that position being made permanent in the months to come, so long as he kept his nose clean and his clear-up rate healthy. It was a pity Anderson hadn’t come with him, but his erstwhile sergeant had been bumped up to acting inspector back at Robin’s previous station, Stanebridge. He’d miss the man’s spiky sense of humour and his sudden bursts of enlightenment, if not his driving style.
Crime was crime anywhere, from big city to leafy village—the Lindenshaw murders had proved that—but the sheer scale of things came into play at Abbotston. It was larger than Stanebridge, much more sprawling, and so there was extra everything, from industrial estates to coffee shops to drug dealers, even if murder was still thankfully rare. It had grown bigger than Kinechester, which was the county “capital” and had been since the time of the Romans, who’d made their base there and left their stamp in the layout of the streets, although Abbotston lacked the history which had secured Kinechester’s importance. At least Abbotston was a step up from Culdover, which might give Robin some bragging rights over Adam if they were into that kind of new-job-related one-upmanship. But they weren’t.
Campbell would never tolerate that, anyway.
A rap at his door—thank goodness he remembered where that was—made Robin look up from the papers on his desk. “Yes?”
“Got a bit of an odd one, sir.” Pru Davis, also newly promoted and blossoming in her role as his sergeant, poked her head round Robin’s door, her brow wrinkled in bewilderment.
“Go on.” Robin had always had a lot of time for Pru. She’d been a keen-as-mustard and deadly efficient constable at Stanebridge, and when the chance to bring her along to Abbotston presented itself, he’d snapped it up. While the pair of them had to make sure they didn’t form an ex-Stanebridge clique—there was history between the two stations that wouldn’t make for an easy ride initially—she’d be moral support for him. The fact she was so good at her job, not something that could be traditionally said for Abbotston coppers, made her presence a win all round, although it carried the risk of alienating the pair further from the locals.
They had a subtle path to walk and a lot of diplomacy to deliver.
“Got a dead body turned up at an archaeological site.”
Robin frowned. “Is this a wind-up? Abbotston city slickers trying to put one over on the yokels?”
“I wish it was.” Pru entered the room, notepad at the ready. “It came from Lewington, down on the front desk, so I doubt it’s a wind-up.”
Lewington appeared to be an old-fashioned sort of career copper, and he had a reputation of not suffering fools gladly. His son was something to do with the BBC sports department so allegedly always had a bit of inside gossip on who to put your shirt on for the Grand National.
“Added to which,” Pru continued, “I recognised the name of the bloke who rang it in, so it seems legitimate. Up at Culford Roman villa.”
“You’d better take a seat and tell me all about it.” Robin jotted down notes while his sergeant gave a brief but pertinent outline. They’d been contacted by Charlie Howarth, who was the bloke at Kinechester council in charge of historic sites, and who’d apparently pulled Pru’s pigtails when they were both only five, back in Risca.
“Risca?”
“Near Newport. Land of my fathers and all that.”
“‘Cwm Rhondda’ and ‘Delilah’?” Robin grinned. “How did you both end up here?”
“Took a wrong turn off the M4.” Pru rolled her eyes. “Charlie was bound to end up by here, given all the history in the area.”
Robin winced at the Welsh argot, which had a habit of coming and going in Pru’s voice. She was right about the history, though; the local area was awash with it. He’d learned back in school that Culdover had been occupied for thousands of years because of its abundant natural resources. Even Kinechester wasn’t as old as Culdover, which had been knocking around since the Neolithic. Like so many places throughout England, it retained evidence of its previous occupants, and many of the local schools made the most of that fact, focussing their trips on both the Iron Age hill fort and Roman villa not five miles from the town centre.
School trips. Please God there’d not be a connection to Adam this time.
Robin refocussed. “What did this mate of yours have to report? It’s not one of those routine ‘found a body; we’re pretty sure it’s from the time of Cromwell, but we have to call it in just in case’ things?”
“Looks unlikely. They’ve had the doctor in.” Pru’s eyebrows shot up. “To declare that this poor soul really is dead despite it being obvious she must have been there months.”
“It’s procedure. Is Grace there too?” Grace was Robin’s favourite crime-scene investigator. If anything had ever evaded her notice, he wasn’t aware of it.
“On route, at least.”
“So what do we know?”
“A routine, planned dig started up earlier today, exploring an area near the villa where somebody reckoned they’d found a new range of buildings. New as in unexcavated.”
“I understand that. I have watched Time Team.” It was one of his mother’s favourite programmes.
“Better you than me, sir, but don’t tell Charlie. He’s at the site, if we want to drive down there.”
Robin fished out his car keys. “Let’s go and hear what he’s got to say.”
There was no easy route directly from Abbotston to Culford; the main roads made two sides of a triangle, and the third was formed of winding country lanes. The old Roman road, which ran straight and true through Tythebarn and other villages and which formed the foundation of Culdover High Street, was the wrong side of the site to be of help.
When they arrived at the car park, Charlie Howarth was already waiting for them, chatting on his phone while trying to sign off some paperwork.
“Sorry about that,” he said in a deep Welsh accent as he ended the call. “Pru, you don’t age, do you?”
“Got a picture in the attic.” Pru’s voice reflected its roots more than normal. “Chief Inspector Bright wants to know all about what you found.”
“Not me who found it. One of the diggers, poor girl.” Howarth—what sort of a Welsh name was that?—winced. “I was going to send her home but thought you might want to interview her.”
“Quite right.” Robin nodded. “Tell us what you can.”
“We started digging the area this morning. Just by hand, nothing mechanical. This is supposed to be a virgin bit of the site, excavation-wise, so we had no idea what we’d turn up.”
“Why here in particular?” Robin asked.
“The university got a grant to do a geophysical survey of the whole area. Do you know what that is?”
“Of course,” Robin snapped. “We’re the Time Team generation. Did you think you’d found a plunge pool?”
Howarth inclined his head. “Sorry. I was being patronising.”
“Apology accepted.” Robin could be gracious when required.
“We weren’t sure what we’d found, to be honest, only that there were signs of underlying structures. Unlike the people on Time Team, we don’t make assumptions until we’ve exposed the archaeology.”
“So what did the digger expose?”
“Part of a mosaic to start with. Bit of a small panel, with some sort of substrate for the tesserae to be embedded in, just lying in the topsoil.” Howarth indicated the size of the thing with his hands. “Very unusual, which is what got Kirsty—that’s the digger I mentioned—so puzzled in the first place. She’d barely raked off anything else when she found black plastic. A sheet or a large strong bag. It was slightly ripped, and hair was protruding through the tear.”
“We’ll get her to supply the details.” Robin couldn’t shake off an instant, and uncharacteristically unprofessional, dislike he’d taken to this witness. “You said this was virgin ground, but if somebody buried a body, then the area must have been disturbed. Did nobody notice?”
Howarth shrugged. “That bit of ground’s been used for all sorts of things over the years, because people didn’t think it was important. There used to be a children’s play area there, but it was taken out. Health and Safety.” He rolled his eyes. “It’s been a right mess since then, so if somebody was careful enough, they could cover their tracks.”
“Hm. How easy is it to get into this place out of hours?”
“The main building’s locked and alarmed.” That made sense, given that the mosaics and hypocaust ruins were in great condition. Culford wasn’t Fishbourne, but it remained impressive. “The rest of the site just has a fence. We weren’t aware of anything that needed protecting.” Howarth gave Pru a rueful smile.
She returned the smile, then adopted her most professional air. “You’ll appreciate there are questions we’ll have to ask you, and statements to be taken, both now and as the details emerge. For a start, are you aware of anyone associated with the site going missing?”
Howarth shook his head. “No, all women accounted for.”
“How do you know it’s a woman we’re concerned with?” Robin interjected.
“Oh, sorry. Kirsty said she reckoned the corpse was female, from what she could see of the hair. Have I spoken out of turn?”
Robin narrowed his eyes. “We don’t make any assumptions about identifying the victim until we hear from our experts.”
“I apologise once more. Thing is, our staff here is predominantly female. We only have one paid employee, Clare, who runs the administration and just about everything else. She gets helped by volunteers so we can have the site open as much as possible.”
“I’ll get a full list of names from Clare, thank you. In the interim, I’d like to talk to the student who found the body. Kirsty, did you say?”
“That’s right. She’ll be up in the staffroom, which is our posh term for that Portakabin.” Howarth pointed towards a dingy green building. “Do you want to talk to her now?”
“After we check in at the scene. Thanks,” Robin added, remembering his manners.
“Shall I take you . . .?”
“No thanks, Charlie.” Pru cuffed his arm. “You’ll be busy enough putting off the school trips and the public. This place needs to be shut to everyone for the time being.”
Howarth’s face dropped. “Hell. I never thought. I’ll get onto it.”
As Robin and his sergeant made their way from the car park to where a white tent indicated the victim’s last resting place, he cast a glance over his shoulder. Howarth was on his phone, talking animatedly. “Is he always like that?”
“Like what, sir?”
“Gets up people’s noses and they can’t work out why.”
Pru laughed. “Yeah, that’s him. Or at least it is if you’re a bloke. They find him a bit smarmy.”
“And what’s he like with women?”
“A charmer. No harm in him, though. He’s always struck me as happily married.” They halted at the point where they’d have to slip on at least gloves and overshoes if they wanted to get closer to the shallow grave. “I suspect if a woman misread the charm and made him an offer, he’d run a mile.”
“Hmm.”
The appearance of Grace, emerging from the tent with a cheery wave, focussed their attention away from smarmy site directors towards the gruesome minutiae. “Coming over for a look, sir?”
“When we’re kitted up. Want us in bunny suits?”
“Please. Whole kit and caboodle. This isn’t Midsomer.” Grace had no time for television crime dramas and the way they played fast and loose with crime scenes and forensic matters. Shoddy procedures and the depiction of seemingly limitless budgets; both riled her. “The doctor has been, to say that she’s definitely dead. He’ll do the postmortem tomorrow.”
“How long has the body been there?” Robin asked once they were inside the tent and had their first glimpse of the corpse. The dismal sight of somebody’s child, somebody’s loved one, cut off in their prime was one Robin would never get used to.
Grace wrinkled her nose. “She’s been there months, rather than days. I’ll be able to give you a better answer when all the tests are done.”
“Definitely a she?” Pru clarified. She waited for Grace’s nod before continuing. “Any idea how old she was?”
“About twenties or thirties, from what I can see of the body and clothes. Although what I can expose has been restricted by the plastic she was wrapped in. We’ll confirm everything as soon as we can, along with cause of death and all the rest of it. I suspect she’s had blunt trauma to the forehead, but she’s in a pretty bad way. The doctor didn’t like the state of the bit of her face that’s visible.”
“Series of blows?”
Grace shrugged. “Can’t tell as yet. Maybe something that happened postmortem. When I know, you will.”
Robin, with a quickly hidden shudder, glanced at the dead woman again. “Do we have a name for her?”
“Not that I’ve found yet. But it’s going to be a slow process. Don’t want to miss anything by rushing.” Grace sighed. “Poor lass.”
“Poor lass, indeed.” Robin forced a rueful smile. “Get all the information you can. She deserves it.”
“I’ll do my best. And then we’ll see what Greg and his pals can make of it.”
“We’ll leave you to it.” The sooner Grace could collect the samples, the sooner they’d be off to the lab for examination.
Once they’d left the CSI to get on with her job and were heading off to find the digger who’d uncovered the body, Pru—pale faced—rubbed her hands as though ridding the grave dirt from them.
“First corpse?” Robin asked, not unkindly. Death took some getting used to.
“First murder, assuming it is a murder. Seen a couple of RTAs.” Thank God that was still the most likely way the local police came across dead bodies. “I imagined it would be the same.”
“But it isn’t?”
“No, and I can’t work out why.” She halted. “Ditch me if I’m being a sea anchor, sir. There must be some of the Abbotston team who’ve got more experience than I have.”
“There are. And they’ll have plenty to exercise that experience on, especially if there’s no ID on our victim. At least you didn’t puke all over your shoes, like Anderson did.”
“Did he?”
“Do you think I’m lying?” He was, but it wouldn’t hurt for her to believe the story for a while. “Fancy a cuppa? Your pal must be able to rustle us up one.”
“No, thanks.” They’d reached the Portakabin door. “He’d only try to find somebody with two X chromosomes to do it. He wouldn’t know one end of a kettle from another.”
Robin grinned, then immediately changed his expression for one suitably serious for interviewing a witness.
Kirsty—they guessed it was her from the name emblazoned on the back of her sweatshirt—was sitting at a table with what appeared to be a colleague. Both had their hands clenched around mugs which somehow looked far too large for them. The Portakabin was comfortably enough decked out, having—apart from the table and chairs—several more comfy armchairs, a sagging sofa, a tiny kitchenette, and another section which appeared to be set aside for the cleaning and sorting of artefacts. A couple of PCs, surprisingly modern, completed the contents. The windows provided a scenic view of the car park, which could be blocked out by blinds when the sight of school coaches and snotty pupils became overwhelming.
The inevitably edgy introductions were made, and Kirsty’s colleague, Abby, offered to make them all a fresh brew, which Robin readily accepted.
“Nothing like this has ever happened before,” Kirsty said, without being asked. “I mean, I’m used to turning up burials or cremations, especially on the edges of Roman sites, but I knew as soon as I saw it that this wasn’t old.”
“Can we take this from the beginning, please? Assume we don’t know a thing,” Robin said in what he hoped were soothing tones. The girl was clearly nervous, and some important element might be lost if they didn’t go through things logically.
“Okay.” Kirsty gave a little background to the dig, which matched what Howarth had said. She and Abby had arrived that morning as the advance guard of a team from Kinechester University, and they’d barely got a couple of inches down when they’d come to the mosaic.
“Where’s that now?” Pru enquired.
“In a finds tray, up by the trench. We lifted it whole, didn’t we, Abby?” she called across to where her colleague was doling teabags into a pot.
“We did.” Abby gestured with her teaspoon, miming the procedure. “After we’d recorded it and everything. It was obvious it wasn’t in situ, so we thought it must have been backfill from some previous dig we didn’t know anything about, or maybe from when they put the play park in.”
“Yes”—Kirsty nodded—“we knew before we started that the ground had been disturbed time and again, and who knows how careless people had been.”
Robin wasn’t sure that the contractors who put in or took out the play equipment would have been allowed to be so gung-ho with any artefacts they turned up, but he let it ride. “And then?”
“And then we cleared back a bit more and found the plastic. I wondered at first if it was from landscaping. You know, people put down black plastic to inhibit weeds. I made some stupid joke about how it wasn’t typically Anglo-Saxon or anything like that, and then I called Abby over. She spotted the tear in the bag and the hair sticking through, so she said we should leave everything as it was.”
“Quite right.” Pru smiled encouragingly. “Did you turn up any other finds before you shut digging down for the day?”
“No. We weren’t expecting to, given how little we’d got down into the soil. If the archaeology is at the same level as the villa, we’d have expected to go down another three feet.”
“Why didn’t you use a mechanical digger to take off the top layers?” Robin had seen that on Time Team too.
“Because we knew the top layers were likely to have already been disturbed and didn’t want to risk missing artefacts in the topsoil.” Abby brought over the steaming mugs of tea, to a chorus of gratitude. “Just as well, isn’t it?”
“Indeed.” Robin blew on his tea, then risked a semi-scalding sip. “Why didn’t you ring us? Protocol?”
“Lack of phone signal. You know what it’s like round here.” Kirsty, taking a draught, didn’t seem to notice how hot the tea was. Maybe she had it milky enough to counteract the heat. “I came down to the office, where Charlie was. Mr. Howarth. He came up to double-check, then went to ring you. You can get signal in here.”
“What did he double-check?” Pru asked.
The students rolled their eyes. “That we hadn’t made a mistake and misidentified a body that was too old to be of interest to you. As though the Romans used plastic.”
“I thought you had to report all bodies, unless they were found properly interred in a burial ground.” Pru looked to Robin, who both shrugged and nodded.
“Always best to call us in.” He took another sip of tea. “Have you any idea of who the dead woman might be?”
Abby and Kirsty shared a How the hell are we supposed to know? glance before shaking their heads.
“I know, it sounds a daft question.” Robin smiled. “But you’d be surprised. People hear things, about somebody who’s gone missing but not been reported to the police, or rumours about odd happenings. Office gossip that turns out to have a basis in truth.”
“Sorry.” Kirsty shook her head again. “Nothing.”
“That mosaic’s a bit off, though,” Abby remarked. “I took a picture of it to send to my tutor. She reckons it’s totally the wrong design and era for this site. She said it looked like a Victorian antiquarian might have hacked it out of somewhere else.”
“Seems fishy,” Robin agreed. “It was definitely on top of the sheeting? The dead woman couldn’t have been holding it in her hands or anything?”
“I doubt it.” Kirsty frowned. “Not unless the plastic had all been disturbed already.”
“Thank you.” Robin took another swig of tea. He’d never be able to manage the entire mug. “We’ll get a constable up here to take formal statements from you both, as well as anybody else who’s on-site. You’d think somebody would have seen or heard something suspicious.”
Abby snorted. “Don’t count on it. I can think of people in my department who’d notice a flint flake three metres away but not spot a bollard until they walked into it.”
“Let’s hope you’re wrong.” Robin had an awful feeling she wouldn’t be.
A Party of Murder by John Inman
Chapter One
FROM THE passenger seat, Jamie Roma slipped a hand under the shirttail of the man driving the car. He chuckled to himself when the car swerved off the road, then lurched back onto the asphalt in a spray of gravel and mud.
Derek Lee growled through what Jamie considered to be the sexiest pair of lips he had ever seen in his life. “Jesus, if that hand had gone into my pants, we’d be dead now.”
“Dead but happy,” Jamie whispered back.
Derek made a sound that was somewhere between a groan and a chuckle. Mostly, Jamie figured, it was a groan. Jamie didn’t mind not getting a laugh at his feeble joke, because at the same time as he was groaning, Derek was also tucking his own hand under his shirt and stroking Jamie’s fingers.
They were motoring across the high desert thirty miles outside San Diego. Even had there been daylight, there would have been nothing to see but rolling hills, a bunch of boulders scattered around like spilled Legos, and about a gazillion clumps of sagebrush. As it was, they couldn’t even see that because darkness had fallen with a resounding thud about three hours back. And now not only was it night, it was a moonless and starless night, thanks to the rain clouds that had been forming overhead all day. If not for the Toyota’s headlights and the gleam of the GPS system on the dashboard, they would have been floundering through a sea of bottomless black shadow—blind, directionless, lost.
It was also lonely. They hadn’t seen another car for ages.
Jamie jumped, pointing through the windshield at a sudden twitch of movement up ahead on the side of the road. “Lookie! A coyote!”
No sooner had he cried out than the animal froze, every ounce of its attention trained on the approaching car. The coyote’s eyes were like teeny tiny flashlights, beaming straight back at them. The beast didn’t run; it didn’t cower; it simply stood there with its front feet on the road and its rear end in the bushes, waiting patiently for the car to speed past so it could go on about its business.
“It’s not afraid of us,” Jamie said.
“Why should it be?” Derek snorted. “It’s not the one that’s lost. And don’t say ‘Lookie.’ You sound like a three-year-old.”
Jamie slapped Derek’s arm at the exact moment he spun around in his seat to look behind them as the car zoomed past the coyote. For the briefest of moments, he spotted the creature flashing to life in the red glow of the car’s taillights. Then the animal melted into the receding darkness as if it had never been there at all. Jamie swung back around and replaced his hand on Derek’s bare belly.
He sighed.
“What’s with the sigh?” Derek asked.
“Nothing. Just happy.”
“You’re not getting romantic, are you?”
It was Jamie’s turn to snort. “I don’t get romantic. I’m just a guy who’s having fun driving along with his oldest friend in the world who happens to be an occasional trick.”
“Occasional as in every single night for the last two months.”
“Well, yeah.”
“After all these years of friendly abstinence together, we suddenly jump into bed and pork like bunny rabbits for eight solid weeks.”
“Pork like bunny rabbits. What a lovely expression. Rates right up there with fuck your balls off.”
“Oh hush. I wonder how it happened.”
“How what happened?”
“How we ended up in bed together that first night.”
Jamie gave Derek time to think about it while he enjoyed the sensation of exploring Derek’s tight little belly button with a fingertip. “Hormones, I guess,” Derek finally said. “Horny, humpy hormones.”
This time when Jamie groaned, it was a real one. “Yeah. And tequila. Lots and lots of tequila. My head still hurts.”
“How about your ass?”
“That too. But in a good way. And that’s from last night, not two months ago.”
They laughed, and Derek stroked Jamie’s hand again, making Jamie’s laugh ratchet down to a dreamy little smile. He couldn’t see it on his own face because he was too lazy to look in the visor mirror, but he knew it was there all the same. It was somewhat worrisome, too, that dreamy, contemplative smile he could feel twitching on his lips. My God, what if he was beginning to feel romantic about Derek? What would that do to their lifelong friendship?
“We met in fifth grade,” Jamie said, pondering out loud.
Derek cracked the window to get some air into the car. Either the night had grown warmer, or he was having a hot flash. He realized, of course, that Jamie’s roving fingers so close to his groin might have something to do with that. “I know. I was there. You tried to steal my milk. Hmm,” he hummed, sticking his nose through the crack, “smell that night air.”
Jamie rolled his own window down, letting in a blast of air that made his hair thrash around on top his head. He stuck his face through the opening, squinting into the night. “Smells like a monsoon coming!” he yelled into the empty countryside.
“They don’t have monsoons in California!” Derek bellowed. “And get back in here. You look like a Rottweiler hanging out a car door with his tongue flapping in the wind.”
Jamie dragged himself back inside. He was grinning like an idiot, hair going every which way. Batting his eyelashes, he leaned against his seat belt and laid his head on Derek’s shoulder. “Ooh, if I was a Rottweiler, we could do it doggy style.”
Derek laughed. “And break every law of nature there is. You’re impossible.”
A sudden flash of lightning sizzled across the sky in front of them, making them both jump. A moment later, fat raindrops began pelting the windshield. Derek switched on the wipers. Soon their comforting song filled the interior of the car. Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh. It was a pleasant sound, Jamie thought. With his head still snuggled against Derek’s shoulder, Jamie returned his hand to Derek’s bare belly. His fingers twiddled idly with the hair around Derek’s navel. Both men grew quiet as they watched the road in front of them darken with rain.
“Any idea where we are?” Jamie asked.
With his lips in Jamie’s hair, Derek gave a good-natured growl. “Oh ye of little faith. I know exactly where we are.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere north of Mexico and south of the Bering Strait.”
“Very funny.”
Derek tapped the GPS monitor on the dashboard. “Honestly. We’re right where we’re supposed to be. See? There should be a turnoff coming up soon, and a few miles after that, a bridge. We’ll cross the bridge and continue on down a gravel side road for fifteen miles or so, and that will lead us unveeringly toward the house we’re trying to find.”
“So you hope,” Jamie drawled.
To which Derek didn’t quibble. “Yes. So I hope.”
For the space of about fifteen seconds, the rain came down so hard that even the windshield wipers couldn’t keep up. The sound was deafening. The downpour pummeled the car, almost stripping Jamie’s breath away. Being a Southern California boy, Jamie was more accustomed to drought. He didn’t like storms. When the rain eased up a little, his blood pressure dropped. He tried to relax. Through the streaming windshield, he could see the empty highway stretching out before them, disappearing into the rainy, wind-tossed distance. Derek tapped his index finger against the steering wheel. Clearly he was about to say something important. Which he finally did.
“I know we’ve been over this a dozen times, but I still don’t understand why we both received invitations to a house party from someone we don’t know.”
“From someone we assume we don’t know,” Jamie corrected. “Since the invitations weren’t signed, we really don’t know if we’re acquainted with the person who sent them or not. Personally, I think it’s some idiot friend of ours.”
“But we don’t know that for sure,” Derek pointed out. “And still, Jamie Roma, you putz, you insisted we come anyway.”
Jamie laughed. “Because it’s an adventure! It’s a lark. It’s mysterious. It’s a weekend house party in the middle of nowhere, fifty miles out of the city, cut off from the world, and being hosted by someone we may or may not know for reasons we haven’t got a clue about. Besides, at the bottom of the invitations they promised heart-stopping door prizes. Quote, unquote. Who could say no to heart-stopping door prizes?”
“Anybody with brains!” Derek snarled. “I’ve seen horror movies that start this way. While we’re tooling down this spookyass, rain-drenched highway heading straight into the maw of oblivion with thunder and lightning crashing and flashing all around us, I can imagine the opening credits of a really gory slasher movie unscrolling over our heads as we speak. Jamie and Derek on the Highway to Hell. Three for the Road with Jamie, Derek, and Leatherface. Queers on Elm Street.”
“That’s quite an imagination you’ve got there. Listen. Have I ever steered you wrong before?”
“Oh please, Jamie. When have you ever not steered me wrong? Remember that Mexican restaurant you wanted to try last week? The one where the cockroach crawled out of my taco?”
“You should have had a burrito.”
Derek ignored that. “I wonder how many guests there will be.”
“Like I care. Let’s just hope the booze doesn’t run out.” Jamie perked up. “Suppose there will be tequila?”
This time Derek’s groan came from the heart. “Oh God, I hope not. One shot of tequila and you end up with your legs in the air, toes pointed straight at the ceiling.”
“Why, thank you.”
Derek laughed. “No, thank you.”
Derek took their lives in his hands by leaning into the darkness and planting a kiss on Jamie’s eagerly expectant mouth. At the same time, their lives were further imperiled when Jamie’s fingers diddled their way south, burrowing under the buckle of Derek’s belt, which he cleverly unclasped with a flick of his thumb. Houdini couldn’t have done it better.
The car swerved again when Jamie wiggled out from under his shoulder harness and lowered his head to Derek’s lap. Rooting around with his nose like a hog hunting truffles, he unearthed exactly what he was searching for, and for the next three miles, not a word was spoken between the two.
The silence was finally broken when Derek stiffened all over and gripped the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles went white. Far beyond his ability to do anything about it, his hips lurched upward and he emitted a delicious moan.
“That’s my boy,” Jamie mumbled, smiling. “Let it go. And try not to run us off a cliff when you do.”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Derek gasped, once again lifting his ass off the seat until there was a good six inches of daylight showing beneath him—if there had been any daylight available on this miserably stormy night. While a brand-new onslaught of rain and wind pummeled the car and rocked it back and forth, he clutched a fistful of Jamie’s hair with the one free hand he dared take off the wheel.
For the next thirty seconds or so, Jamie Roma worked just as hard as the windshield wipers—trying desperately to stay ahead of the deluge.
When I looked around the police station, I was shocked that no cops were interfering in what was clearly a kidnapping. I shouldn’t have been too surprised. After all, in my book, police didn’t have a very good track record for doing what was right.
“No, Snow, we aren’t strangers anymore. You come home and my pop will protect you. That’s what he does.”
Who the hell was his pop? Surviving was a lot about picking your battles. Looking around the precinct, it was obvious my choices weren’t going to win out. Frank and his goons weren’t going to let me pass. On the off chance I got away, then I’d have Roy and these guys chasing me.
“I don’t think I have a choice, do I?” Frank shook his head. “Okay then. Onward, my good man!”
If the limo wasn’t a huge giveaway that Simon’s pop was disgustingly rich, the enormous mansion with the iron gate was. Two large Ms were worked into the iron. The house had a medieval look about it. A fountain of fear was on display in the middle of the circular driveway, some sort of gargoyles spitting water out of their mouths… or was it their eyes? Gray stone, iron, and darkness made up this house. Whoever this guy was, he wasn’t just rich, he was powerful. Leaning over, I whispered in Simon’s ear, “Is your pop Tony Stark?”
Simon chuckled. “No silly, he’s Christopher Manos.”
Christopher Manos? Oh, son of a bitch. At least Iron Man was on the right side of justice.
“Come on, Snow, you can meet my pop!” Simon grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the limo with all his might. When we came to the stone steps and I looked up, I came face to face with not only the most dangerous man in this city, but the most gorgeous. He was broad, and I could see the muscles in his arms and legs even through his expensive suit. He had midnight black hair and obsidian eyes. There was no doubt he and Simon were related.
“Pop!” Simon ran into his arms. The man didn’t miss a beat. He scooped Simon up without ever taking his eyes off me. “That’s Snow. He saved me.”
“Mr. Manos, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’ll have you know, I didn’t want to come here. I was forced. You have a beautiful home and a great kid and if you just let me go, I’ll happily walk home.”
He stared at me coldly. “You don’t know my home is beautiful, you haven’t seen it. Let’s rectify that. Come in.” He turned and walked inside. The nudge from Frank was likely the only encouragement I’d get.
I hope I don’t die.
The Mystery of the Moving Image by CS Poe
IF THERE was one thing I’d taken away from the last six months of murder and mystery, it was to expect the unexpected.
Max Ridley and I stared at a four-foot-tall wooden crate that had been delivered to the Emporium that morning. Neither of us had spoken for a good minute.
“Five bucks says there’s a dead body inside,” he finally said.
I shook my head. “We’d smell decomp.”
“A normal person wouldn’t say that,” he replied, not looking away from the box.
“Normal is relative.”
“Let’s not get into a philosophical debate before 10:00 a.m.”
I took a step forward and snatched the shipping label from the plastic envelope slapped on the front of the crate. I unfolded it and held my magnifying glass up to the small print.
“Who’s it from?” Max asked.
“I’m not sure.”
“Should I call 911?”
I glanced up. “The last time we did that, they sent a vigilante who tried to kill me.”
“That’s true.” Max held up his cell. “But I know three cops and an FBI agent by proxy, so we have options.”
“Calm down.”
“I don’t trust mystery packages, Seb. Not anymore.”
I looked at the label again. “It came from a shipping company on the Upper East Side.”
“But no name?”
“No.”
“Is it addressed to you?”
“Owner,” I clarified.
“I’m calling the cops.”
I looked at Max, reached out, and put my hand over his cell. “Calvin probably just ordered something for the apartment.”
Ah yes, that had been one bit of good to come out of losing my home to an explosion back in February. It’d taken just over two months of searching and Realtor harassing, but as of yesterday, Snow and Winter were the new tenants of 4B—a loft apartment in the East Village above a coffee shop and hippy-dippy clothing store. And despite the insurmountable odds, I was able to tick off every single one of my neurotic must-haves and still keep to a rent that wouldn’t bleed me and Calvin dry. I mean, it was by far more expensive than my old, cozy, rent-controlled place, but seeing as how I was putting my name on the bills with a guy I liked a lot—yeah. Seemed worth the extra cash.
“Call him and ask,” Max replied.
“He’s busy with manly stuff,” I answered.
“What?”
“Unpacking, lifting heavy things, inserting tabs into slots….”
“I’ll quit.”
“Jesus, Max—”
“Just call him.”
I let out an annoyed huff, took my phone from my back pocket, pulled Calvin up in the recent contacts, and called.
“Hey, baby,” Calvin answered.
“Hey,” I said. “Got a second?”
“For you? Several.”
“Aren’t you cute.”
Calvin laughed. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah. I just had a package delivered here at the Emporium and was wondering if you’d ordered something big—like, a chandelier—for the apartment?”
“And had it shipped there?” he asked, sounding unsure.
“Uh-huh.”
“No.”
I frowned and glanced sideways at Max. “I’ve got a four-foot-tall mystery box in the middle of my showroom.”
“Since when has that ever stopped you, Hercule?”
I smiled a little. “Ohhh….”
“Like that?” Calvin asked.
“I do.”
“I knew you would.”
I laughed, much to Max’s displeasure. “Figured I’d check in with you before cracking it open. I tend to get a lot of junk this way. People cleaning out grandma’s attic ship me garbage and say ‘keep it until it sells,’ like I’m a warehouse.”
“No return address, then?” Calvin asked, and in the background, I could hear tape being torn off a cardboard box. I’d offered to close the Emporium to help him finish unpacking the apartment, but he’d politely kissed my forehead and shoved me out the front door that morning.
“Some shipping and supply office way the hell uptown.”
“Huh.”
“Were you expecting a housewarming gift?” I tried. Not that anyone in Calvin’s family even knew we’d moved in together. They’d completely stopped talking to him at Christmastime when he’d come out—the exception being Calvin’s Uncle Nelson. Nelson was a sweet old guy. I’d said hello on the phone a few times. He was nothing like the impression I had of Calvin’s father, a retired military man who hated me on principle alone.
“No,” Calvin answered.
“I’m going to tear into this crate.”
“Don’t let me stop you.”
“I’ll see you tonight,” I said.
“I’ll be the big sweaty guy in the house,” Calvin replied.
“I love when you’re sweaty.”
“Boss,” Max interrupted, and I swear I could hear his eye-roll.
Calvin was laughing over the line. “Bye, sweetheart.”
“Bye.” I stuffed my phone into my pocket.
“When’s the honeymoon?”
“Stop it,” I muttered.
“It’s not Calvin’s, then?” Max asked.
I shook my head. “Nope. Would you grab a hammer from the office?”
“All right,” he answered a bit reluctantly. Max left my side, hiked up the stairs, went past the register, and disappeared into my closet-sized office. “But if there’s anything inside that’s dead, dying, or threatening to kill either of us, I’m burning this place to the ground because it’s totally cursed.”
“I’m not sure whether you’re trying to save me or screw me over,” I said, mostly to myself, but Max heard me.
“Saving you, believe me,” he replied. He jumped off the stairs and approached with the hammer. “Move aside.”
“You want to open it?”
“Maybe if I’m the one to do it, it’ll negate any potential chaos that would otherwise befall you.”
“You’re so sweet.” I took a step back and crossed my arms.
“Is that guy from the Javits Center’s Antique Fair still coming by today?” Max asked as he stuck the back of the hammer under the wooden lid and pushed down on the handle. The nails squeaked loudly as they were pulled free.
“He’s supposed to.”
“He was supposed to on Saturday.”
“And Sunday,” I clarified. “Then I canceled yesterday so I could move. If he doesn’t come today to pick up my items for the show, they can kiss my ass next year when they’re looking for sponsorship money.”
“Seriously.” Max laughed, then moved the hammer and hoisted the lid once more. “So how’s the new place?” He glanced over his shoulder at me.
I winced as more nails screeched free from the wood. “Good. I’m hoping our bed will be delivered today. Spent last night on the living room floor.”
“At least you had a hunky ginger to keep you company.”
“Very true.”
There’d been a lot of change in my life as of late. Mostly for the good, of course.
Business was going great, despite the seemingly bad luck the Emporium had in terms of being a target in the Nevermore and Curiosities cases—but we’d all escaped those with our heads still attached. And after a long line of bad-for-me boyfriends, I’d just moved in with a guy who was my soul mate. Friends and family were healthy, happy—I was even a pet owner now.
So yeah, a lot of things were good.
But I guess that’s why I’d also been sidelined by anxieties lately. I wasn’t expecting old self-doubts when I was on top of the world.
Like, one too many of Calvin’s compliments had gone to my head, and when my clothes had been torched in the fire, I’d purchased a new wardrobe for the first time in… at least a decade. No more secondhand crap. I now owned formfitting, colored clothes. I thought they’d finally give a boost of confidence to my appearance, an insecurity I usually hid with self-deprecating humor, except it’d turned out to be nothing but dread since day one.
And I knew how… stupid it must have sounded. But until someone has been intensely uncomfortable in their clothes, I didn’t think people realized just how much a wardrobe could make or break them. Yeah, the secondhand shit didn’t fit, was old and worn-out, but it was safe. I didn’t need to check a color wheel before putting something on. I disappeared into a crowd. Now every morning was approached with a certain level of trepidation. Were people staring because I clashed and was an eyesore? Were they staring because I wasn’t the best-looking guy and these clothes made me stand out when I used to blend in? They must wonder what Calvin was doing slumming with a guy like me.
Of course I hadn’t said any of this out loud.
Hell would sooner freeze over.
Max lifted the top from the crate, set it on the floor, then peered inside. “Lots of padding. Looks like a piece of furniture.”
I took a few steps forward to see for myself. Wedged between the object and the crate wall was a smaller wrapped item. I tugged it free. “Pull the front of the crate off, will you? We can’t lift that out.”
“Sure thing.” Max took the hammer and went at more of the nails.
I set the smaller item down on a nearby display table and carefully removed the bubble wrap. Nestled within was a round metal canister. I carefully picked it up. There was weight to it.
“You know,” Max said, around the tearing of wooden planks. “If we go through all this and it’s some fugly television from the 1950s….”
I stared at the canister for another moment. “Not a television,” I murmured.
“What?” Max tore off another piece of wood.
“It’s not a TV,” I said again, turning to look at him.
He glanced at the crate and motioned to the item within. “It’s hard to see through the wrapping, but it looks like one of those with the built-in cabinet.”
I walked back to the crate, reached inside, and yanked away the padding. “This is—” I caught myself from finishing, almost like I didn’t want to jinx it. I tore out layer after layer of careful packaging, revealing a spectacularly well-preserved cabinet. “Jesus Christ,” I swore.
“What is it?”
“A Kinetoscope.”
“A what-o-scope?”
“Kinetoscope. A one-person movie viewer, patented by Thomas Edison,” I said, looking at Max. “This was before they’d figured out how to project a moving image to a large audience.” I leaned into the crate and pointed. “See here, you look through the peephole on top. There’s a bulb inside that backlights the frames, and the film is spooled through the cabinet.”
“It’s original?” Max asked.
I rubbed my bristly chin and stared hard. “I think so. Help me pull it out. And for the love of God—”
“Be careful,” Max finished for me.
“The Kinetoscope wasn’t around very long,” I said as we walked the cabinet out of the crate. “As the film industry grew, inventions became obsolete fairly quickly.”
“How did these work, though?” Max asked. “I mean, people didn’t have them in homes, right?”
“Oh no. You’d go to a Kinetoscope parlor. There used to be one here in New York, you know. Taking inflation into account, Edison was charging the parlors somewhere around six hundred dollars for the reel of film.”
“Hell of a businessman.” Max began picking up the mess once we’d gotten the Kinetoscope situated in an empty space of showroom floor. “What was in the little package?”
“A film reel,” I said, hands on my hips as I made a slow circuit around the case.
“Really?” he asked excitedly.
“Niche market makes this difficult to price. It’d be the historical value—”
“Seb. Home movie. Focus.”
I glanced up. “What about it?”
Max made exaggerated gestures at where I’d left the canister. “Let’s see what’s on it.”
I dropped my hands from my hips and went to the table. “I doubt it’s in any sort of salvageable condition.”
“Why do you say that?” he asked, going to the register counter and retrieving a pair of cloth gloves.
“Films simply weren’t well preserved back then. Acid ate away at the celluloid. Sometimes there were studio fires, or old reels were just destroyed. They had no intrinsic value at the time,” I explained.
Max offered the gloves as he joined me.
I put them on. “This would have also been before silent film stars like Charlie Chaplin or Harold Lloyd began protecting their work.” I picked up the canister again and held it close, studying the front and back side.
Max leaned against the table and crossed his arms lightly. “I remember watching Fred Ott’s Sneeze in my Film History class. That was Edison’s, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, first copyrighted film in the United States,” I murmured. Fred Ott had been a gentleman who worked for Edison, who by all accounts had a particularly memorable sneeze. It was one of the test reels shot by W. K. L. Dickson, Edison’s assistant, who was the brilliant inventor of the Kinetograph camera and Scope viewer. “But even that film didn’t survive,” I continued. “It was submitted to the Library of Congress as a series of still images, later reanimated into a movie.”
“How do you know this?”
“I took notes in college.” I carefully removed the canister lid.
“You’re the guy at the cocktail party everyone regrets striking up a conversation with.”
“Yeah, probably.” I set the lid aside and stared at the spool of film. It looked… okay. Better than okay. Intact. Playable, even. “This is incredible. Look here—it has the perforations along the side of the frames.”
Max leaned close, reached out, and hovered his finger above the strip of film I held. “So, what, those holes feed in the Kinetoscope, right?”
“Right. Edison patented that concept as well, but it was Dickson who came up with the idea to slice 70mm film in half and make perforations. Afterward, the company was able to submit custom orders for film stock with these exact specifications for their machines.”
“Hundred-twenty-year-old movie,” Max said with an astonished tone. “It’s going to be either porn or cats.”
I laughed and took the film canister with me to the Kinetoscope. I stooped, opened the cabinet, and studied the mechanical setup.
“Are you going to try to play the film?”
“Sure.” I looked back at Max. “You want to see what it is, right?”
“Duh.”
We sat in front of the Kinetoscope, studying old patent schematics I brought up on my phone, and tried to duplicate the arrangement with our mystery film stock. After about twenty minutes of “Be careful,” “No, the other way,” “The other, other way,” and the classic, “Oh shit,” we got it fed through the long system of spools.
Max was tearing through the crate’s packaging once again.
“What’re you doing?” I called, carefully shutting the cabinet.
“Looking for a note.”
“Is there one?”
“No.” More shuffling followed, and then Max peered down over the top of the cabinet at me. “This has to be from someone you know, don’t you think?”
“Why do you say that?”
“Trusting you with such a rare artifact.”
“I do love a good ego stroke,” I muttered before getting to my feet.
“Not to mention that shipping a crate is expensive, even if it’s just from one end of the city to the other,” Max concluded. The shop phone rang and he left my side to answer it.
“I’ll call the shipping company today,” I said, mostly to myself once Max started talking on the phone. “See if they can provide me with the client’s contact information….”
“Boss,” Max said. He wove in between displays, reaching the phone out. “It’s Pete-Ain’t-Never-Gonna-Show from the fair.”
My shoulders dropped a bit. I took the phone. “Pete?”
“Hey! Snow! I got your message about the pickup.”
I pursed my lips. “I left that message on Sunday. It’s Tuesday.”
“Well, yeah, but you weren’t open yesterday.”
“You were supposed to be here on Saturday, Pete. I’ve had my stock for the fair boxed and waiting since last Friday.”
“Look, I’m sorry about missing the pickup window, but it’s been a busy week of prepping for the event. We welcome our sponsors to drop items off at the Javits Center themselves.”
“I don’t drive,” I replied. “And I shouldn’t have to trek to the ass-end of Hell’s Kitchen myself when I’m paying a sponsorship level that includes the pickup and delivery of all inventory on display for the fair.”
Max winced, I think on Pete’s behalf.
The antiquing community didn’t have a lot of thirty-three-year-olds in it. And there were some members who didn’t enjoy taking a young’un like me seriously. Most had no idea how hard I’d worked to get where I was in the business.
I’d gone into debt to obtain an MFA and put in several years as a sort-of apprentice under one of the biggest assholes in the industry, my late boss Mike Rodriguez. I took pride in my shop and had labored for three years to cultivate and bring attention to obscure relics of our past. Now, my clients returned time and again because they knew the knowledge, inventory, and attention to detail they’d receive from me was top-notch. Snow’s Antique Emporium has since become the sort of business that the Javits Antique Fair reaches out to, requesting I sponsor their event.
So I might have been one of the younger members of the community, but God save the poor bastard who took my hard-earned money and didn’t meet my expectations in return.
“I’m coming by today,” Pete answered, sounding rather unfazed by my agitation.
“The fair opens tomorrow.”
“And that’s why I’m coming today,” he reiterated, like I was the dense one.
The bell above the Emporium’s door chimed. Max and I both turned to see Beth Harrison standing in the open doorway. She was my business neighbor and the owner of Good Books, was about Pop’s age, and had long ago lost her last fuck to give.
“Good morning!” she declared, walking toward us with something in her hands.
“When will you be here?” I asked Pete as Max left me in favor of Beth.
“Oh… should be between eleven and… threeish?”
“Traffic across town must be a real bitch,” I answered, deadpan.
“You’ll be there when I stop in, right?”
“Unfortunately.”
“Good. I’ll need you to sign a few forms.”
“Fine.”
“Will you be at the fair tomorrow?” Pete asked next.
I looked up. Beth was giving me a curious expression. Max was staring at his phone. “Let’s just focus on today first, shall we?” I muttered a goodbye and ended the call.
Beth walked forward. “Someone’s got his grumpy pants on this morning.”
“I’m actually in a good mood,” I corrected. “That was Pete White from the fair. He was supposed to be here four days ago to pick up my collection for the show.”
“How professional,” she said sarcastically.
Max raised his head and turned his phone to show me the screen, even though I was too far away to make out the image. “Marshall’s Oddities is a sponsor, and he’s already set up at the Center.”
Marshall’s Oddities, owned and operated by copycat Greg Thompson, was my only real competition in the city. I said “competition” because he’d basically stolen my shop’s image of “curious and bizarre” and still tried to pilfer my customers whenever possible. I was more than happy to supply the names of fellow dealers to my clients if there’s something they want outside my wheelhouse, because in turn those businesses sent customers to me. But not Greg. He’d never once scratched my back.
Frankly, I didn’t want him to. Or trust him to.
We did not get along, and I was okay with that being the entirety of our relationship. Although… it might also be partly due to the fact that last December I suspected Greg was the nutjob behind the Nevermore murders. But hey. Honest mistake.
“How’d you find that out?” I asked.
“Facebook.”
I grunted.
Max put his phone away.
Beth held up the plate in her hands. “So… how’re you boys on this fine May morning?”
“Why are you so chipper?” Max asked. “You’re talking like a fairy godmother.”
Beth snorted. “I am not. You’ve just spent too much time around your boss, whose good moods resemble most people’s bad moods.”
“They do not,” I grumbled.
“Be nice,” she responded. “I’ve got cookies.”
“Were you going to share?” I asked. “Or were you just taking them for a walk?”
“I don’t know why the hell I put up with you sometimes, Sebby.” Beth handed me the plate. “I come bearing gifts and you give me sass.”
“It’s my default setting,” I replied. I picked up a cookie and took a bite.
“Well, you’d better watch it,” Beth continued, “or that’s the last cookie I share with you.”
I held the plate out of reach. “No take backs,” I said around a full mouth.
Beth was always complaining that customers were stealing her pens. I noted she had three or four stuffed into her bun that morning but decided to let her find those on her own. She was wearing a feline-inspired top, although subtle today—just a cat nose and whiskers—but she also wore leggings with creatures on them that looked half-taco, half-cat, so… a typical wardrobe day for Beth.
“Are you dating a mechanic?” I asked, pointing at her clunky boots.
Beth looked down briefly. “My cat barfed in my Birkenstocks this morning.”
“Charming,” I answered.
Beth put her hands on her hips and walked toward the Kinetoscope. “What have you got here?”
“This is a whatchamacallit,” Max said, pointing at the cabinet.
“A what?” Beth asked.
“Kinetoscope,” I said around the final bite of cookie.
“What does it do?”
“It’s a one-person movie viewer,” Max answered, parroting my explanations back to Beth. “It even came with a 120-year-old film.”
“You don’t say?”
“My money is on porn or cats,” he continued.
“I like those odds,” she agreed.
I set the plate on a nearby table and wiped crumbs from the front of my sweater-vest.
“Sebby.”
I looked up. “Seb, Beth. Seb.”
She ignored me. “You look so handsome in green.”
“I thought this was blue.”
She and Max shook their heads.
“Christ,” I muttered to myself, looking back down.
“Seb was about to turn the Kinetoscope on,” Max said, almost like he’d caught my it’s-not-blue anxiety and changed the subject. “Want to stay for the big unveiling?”
Beth clapped her hands together. “Oh yes! Let’s see what you have.”
I stepped back to the cabinet and gave the Kinetoscope a final once-over before daring to power it on for what might have been the first time in over a hundred years. But against all odds, the machine came to life, the wheels inside making sound as the film was set into a continuous loop. I moved around to the front and glanced in the peephole. The bulb illuminating the projected stills was bright, and I had to squint as I watched.
It turned out the mystery footage wasn’t Victorian porn or cats, but instead, a boxing match. And one I recognized, at that.
The Leonard-Cushing fight of 1894. It was sold by Edison as an authentic fight, but the truth was, it was staged and filmed at his studio, Black Maria, in Jersey. Regardless, it was the first boxing match to be recorded, and of the six reels that were once for sale to the Kinetoscope parlors, less than a full round still existed today. The knockout footage—naturally the most popular round with customers—hadn’t survived.
At least, it hadn’t thirty seconds ago.
Because I was watching it now.
Leonard won. I knew he would, but no one in modern times had ever seen it.
I opened my mouth to say… something, but there was a weird blip in the film, some distortion, and then the scene was different. It was outdoors, the image dark and grainy. Some odd lighting, just above two figures in the scene, illuminated a street that otherwise would have been engulfed in nighttime. The figures appeared to be men—neither from the prior boxing scene. One had very distinctive muttonchops and a bit of a gut. The second man was pretty nondescript. They seemed to be arguing, but the frame rate the movie had been shot at was different from what was used today, making their motions quick and dramatic-looking, so it was hard to tell.
Without warning, Muttonchops pulled something from inside his coat, and the motion blurred as he lunged. Nondescript Man held his neck and then crumpled to the ground. Muttonchops stared down at him for a few seconds, dropped whatever he had been holding, and ran.
The scene looped and brought me back to the fight.
“So?” Max asked excitedly.
I raised my head, looking at him and Beth. “I… think I just witnessed a murder.”
Two Feet Under by Charlie Cochrane
Chapter One
“And this is our safeguarding checklist. If you’ll just sign it to show you’ve read it and agree to abide by it . . .”
Adam nodded, read the sheet of paper, then signed and dated it at the bottom.
Adam Matthews, deputy headteacher. 10th April.
He fancied writing the job title again, as it had felt so good the first time. His first deputy headship, and a real chance to put a feather in his cap, given that Culdover Church of England Primary School officially “required improvement.” He’d been recruited to help the new headteacher light such a firework under the staff that by the next time the Ofsted inspectors popped their cheery heads round the door, they’d rate the school as at least “good.”
Before any of that could happen, though, he’d have to go through the standard induction procedure, almost all of it necessary, some of it boring, and some elements—like safeguarding and the location of the men’s toilets—vital.
Soon everything was done and he had the chance to familiarise himself with the place, including sitting in with his year-six class, which he’d be taking two days a week and who were at present under the beady eye of Mrs. Daniel, the teacher who’d have them the other three days. The pupils seemed a cheery enough bunch, eager to show their new deputy just how good they were at maths. He sat down at one of the tables, where they were mulling over fractions, although it wasn’t long before they wanted to bombard him with questions, a new member of staff—and that rare thing in primary education, a man—being much more interesting than halves and quarters. In the end, Adam, Mrs. Daniel, and the pupils came to the arrangement of making the last five minutes of the lesson a question-and-answer session, in return for which the children would work like billy-o up to that point. The plan worked.
“Which team do you support, sir?” opened the official interrogation.
“Saracens for rugby. Abbotston for football.”
“Are you married, sir?”
“No.” Until he had an idea of how mature his class were, he’d better keep quiet about the exact nature of his relationship. “But I’ve got a Newfoundland dog called Campbell.”
“Wow! Will you bring in a picture of him?”
“Of course. I’ll put it on the desk so he can keep an eye on you all.” One day perhaps he’d also be able to bring a picture of Robin in to show the class, but that was probably wishful thinking. Children had open minds, yet too often they got filled with an imitation of their parents’ prejudices.
“I interviewed you, sir,” one spiky-haired lad piped up.
“I remember.” The school-council part of the interview process had been trickier than facing the headteacher and governors. “You asked me to sing a song.”
“Yeah. And you made us sing one instead.” The boy chortled, his classmates joining in.
“I remember. No point in getting old if you can’t get cunning.” Adam grinned. “Right, one last question.”
One of the girls—with an expression more serious than normally came with her age—raised her hand among a sea of others. She waited for Adam’s nod before asking, “Which school did you used to teach at?”
Adam forced his grin to keep going. “Lindenshaw. Lindenshaw St. Crispin’s, to give it its full name.”
“Oh.” The girl turned pale. “My dad told me they had a murder there. Is that why you left?”
Adam paused. So the school’s reputation was preceding it?
Mrs. Daniel, obviously flustered, said, “I don’t think we should talk about things like that.”
Adam pursed his lips. “I think I disagree. It’s better to have stuff in the open, and I’d have hoped this class is mature enough to discuss matters like that sensibly.” How best to describe what had happened? Simply stating that there’d been a murder in what had been the children’s kitchen, where the pupils had once learned to make semi-inedible fairy cakes, might put these pupils off cookery for life. “Somebody was killed, which is a really rare thing to happen in a school. None of the children were ever at risk, and the police found the killer very quickly.”
And he’d found a partner in the process, which had been the best outcome from a wretched time.
The spiky-haired lad chipped in again. “My dad says that you probably can’t go anywhere in Culdover without walking over a place where someone’s died. What with the Romans and the air raids and—”
Adam raised a hand. “I think that’s where we’ll leave it. Time for lunch.”
The class left their chairs, lined up at the door, and waited for Mrs. Daniel to let them out to their pre-lunch play. Just another first day of term for the children at Culdover, but for Adam it was that cliché: “the first day of the rest of his life.” He’d miss Lindenshaw school—that went without saying, especially as it was starting to show a real improvement under the new headteacher—but his regrets would be few. The place held far too many unpleasant memories and associations now, and not simply in terms of the murder. Just last term a young teacher had thrown away the chances of a good career because he couldn’t keep his fists to himself.
Worst of all, but predating Adam’s sojourn at Lindenshaw, it had been Robin’s school, where he’d been subjected to continual bullying.
Adam had promised to keep in touch with those of his colleagues who’d become genuine friends, but the building itself . . . The sooner Adam could shake the dust of the place off his shoes, the better.
He decided to spend his lunchtime mingling in the Culdover staffroom, getting into the normal school routine as soon as possible, then he’d give Robin a quick bell, and he wouldn’t need to wander a quarter of a mile to do so. Another thing he wouldn’t miss about Lindenshaw school was the mobile-phone black spot it sat in, which made reception a hit-or-miss affair unless you braved the women’s toilets, where the signal was said to be perfect. Adam had always opted for the quarter-mile walk.
“How’s it going?” Robin said when Adam had done his mingling and reported in.
“Much as expected.” What was there to say about a typical first morning? “Friendly place, good team, interesting pupils.”
Robin sniggered. “Interesting as in potential psychopaths?”
“Do you think of everyone as a potential criminal?”
“Only if they come from Culdover.”
“Don’t let them hear you say that.” Culdover was a typically English small town, one that had been distinctly posh in its heyday although it had gone downhill post-war, and parts of it were looking rather ropey. Regeneration had made a difference in some places, but the preponderance of charity shops on the high street showed there was plenty still to do. “Busy today?”
“Usual sort of stuff. Spate of upmarket car thefts. Case of dognapping too. I won’t tell Campbell.”
“Make sure you don’t. He’ll have nightmares.” At work one of them may report to a headteacher and the other to a chief superintendent, but at home the roost was ruled by a large, black, wet-nosed Newfoundland dog, whose self-estimation had been swelled by his having saved both of his masters’ lives on separate occasions.
“Got to go. Villains to nick. See you tonight.”
“Yeah. Don’t forget the milk.”
“I won’t.”
Adam smiled. Their house was well stocked with semi-skimmed, but “don’t forget the milk” and its response “I won’t,” or some slight variation on them, had become code for “I love you” and “I love you too,” which couldn’t always be used. Even if Robin and Adam were no longer in the closet, sometimes common sense had to prevail.
* * * * * * *
Robin ended the call, finished his sandwich, and got back to his paperwork. He glanced up at the clock, only to find that it wasn’t where he’d expected. How long was it going to take him to get used to this new office and new location?
Abbotston nick wasn’t proving so bad in the wake of chucking out the rotten apples. It was better still, Robin believed, now that he was the acting chief inspector with every prospect of that position being made permanent in the months to come, so long as he kept his nose clean and his clear-up rate healthy. It was a pity Anderson hadn’t come with him, but his erstwhile sergeant had been bumped up to acting inspector back at Robin’s previous station, Stanebridge. He’d miss the man’s spiky sense of humour and his sudden bursts of enlightenment, if not his driving style.
Crime was crime anywhere, from big city to leafy village—the Lindenshaw murders had proved that—but the sheer scale of things came into play at Abbotston. It was larger than Stanebridge, much more sprawling, and so there was extra everything, from industrial estates to coffee shops to drug dealers, even if murder was still thankfully rare. It had grown bigger than Kinechester, which was the county “capital” and had been since the time of the Romans, who’d made their base there and left their stamp in the layout of the streets, although Abbotston lacked the history which had secured Kinechester’s importance. At least Abbotston was a step up from Culdover, which might give Robin some bragging rights over Adam if they were into that kind of new-job-related one-upmanship. But they weren’t.
Campbell would never tolerate that, anyway.
A rap at his door—thank goodness he remembered where that was—made Robin look up from the papers on his desk. “Yes?”
“Got a bit of an odd one, sir.” Pru Davis, also newly promoted and blossoming in her role as his sergeant, poked her head round Robin’s door, her brow wrinkled in bewilderment.
“Go on.” Robin had always had a lot of time for Pru. She’d been a keen-as-mustard and deadly efficient constable at Stanebridge, and when the chance to bring her along to Abbotston presented itself, he’d snapped it up. While the pair of them had to make sure they didn’t form an ex-Stanebridge clique—there was history between the two stations that wouldn’t make for an easy ride initially—she’d be moral support for him. The fact she was so good at her job, not something that could be traditionally said for Abbotston coppers, made her presence a win all round, although it carried the risk of alienating the pair further from the locals.
They had a subtle path to walk and a lot of diplomacy to deliver.
“Got a dead body turned up at an archaeological site.”
Robin frowned. “Is this a wind-up? Abbotston city slickers trying to put one over on the yokels?”
“I wish it was.” Pru entered the room, notepad at the ready. “It came from Lewington, down on the front desk, so I doubt it’s a wind-up.”
Lewington appeared to be an old-fashioned sort of career copper, and he had a reputation of not suffering fools gladly. His son was something to do with the BBC sports department so allegedly always had a bit of inside gossip on who to put your shirt on for the Grand National.
“Added to which,” Pru continued, “I recognised the name of the bloke who rang it in, so it seems legitimate. Up at Culford Roman villa.”
“You’d better take a seat and tell me all about it.” Robin jotted down notes while his sergeant gave a brief but pertinent outline. They’d been contacted by Charlie Howarth, who was the bloke at Kinechester council in charge of historic sites, and who’d apparently pulled Pru’s pigtails when they were both only five, back in Risca.
“Risca?”
“Near Newport. Land of my fathers and all that.”
“‘Cwm Rhondda’ and ‘Delilah’?” Robin grinned. “How did you both end up here?”
“Took a wrong turn off the M4.” Pru rolled her eyes. “Charlie was bound to end up by here, given all the history in the area.”
Robin winced at the Welsh argot, which had a habit of coming and going in Pru’s voice. She was right about the history, though; the local area was awash with it. He’d learned back in school that Culdover had been occupied for thousands of years because of its abundant natural resources. Even Kinechester wasn’t as old as Culdover, which had been knocking around since the Neolithic. Like so many places throughout England, it retained evidence of its previous occupants, and many of the local schools made the most of that fact, focussing their trips on both the Iron Age hill fort and Roman villa not five miles from the town centre.
School trips. Please God there’d not be a connection to Adam this time.
Robin refocussed. “What did this mate of yours have to report? It’s not one of those routine ‘found a body; we’re pretty sure it’s from the time of Cromwell, but we have to call it in just in case’ things?”
“Looks unlikely. They’ve had the doctor in.” Pru’s eyebrows shot up. “To declare that this poor soul really is dead despite it being obvious she must have been there months.”
“It’s procedure. Is Grace there too?” Grace was Robin’s favourite crime-scene investigator. If anything had ever evaded her notice, he wasn’t aware of it.
“On route, at least.”
“So what do we know?”
“A routine, planned dig started up earlier today, exploring an area near the villa where somebody reckoned they’d found a new range of buildings. New as in unexcavated.”
“I understand that. I have watched Time Team.” It was one of his mother’s favourite programmes.
“Better you than me, sir, but don’t tell Charlie. He’s at the site, if we want to drive down there.”
Robin fished out his car keys. “Let’s go and hear what he’s got to say.”
There was no easy route directly from Abbotston to Culford; the main roads made two sides of a triangle, and the third was formed of winding country lanes. The old Roman road, which ran straight and true through Tythebarn and other villages and which formed the foundation of Culdover High Street, was the wrong side of the site to be of help.
When they arrived at the car park, Charlie Howarth was already waiting for them, chatting on his phone while trying to sign off some paperwork.
“Sorry about that,” he said in a deep Welsh accent as he ended the call. “Pru, you don’t age, do you?”
“Got a picture in the attic.” Pru’s voice reflected its roots more than normal. “Chief Inspector Bright wants to know all about what you found.”
“Not me who found it. One of the diggers, poor girl.” Howarth—what sort of a Welsh name was that?—winced. “I was going to send her home but thought you might want to interview her.”
“Quite right.” Robin nodded. “Tell us what you can.”
“We started digging the area this morning. Just by hand, nothing mechanical. This is supposed to be a virgin bit of the site, excavation-wise, so we had no idea what we’d turn up.”
“Why here in particular?” Robin asked.
“The university got a grant to do a geophysical survey of the whole area. Do you know what that is?”
“Of course,” Robin snapped. “We’re the Time Team generation. Did you think you’d found a plunge pool?”
Howarth inclined his head. “Sorry. I was being patronising.”
“Apology accepted.” Robin could be gracious when required.
“We weren’t sure what we’d found, to be honest, only that there were signs of underlying structures. Unlike the people on Time Team, we don’t make assumptions until we’ve exposed the archaeology.”
“So what did the digger expose?”
“Part of a mosaic to start with. Bit of a small panel, with some sort of substrate for the tesserae to be embedded in, just lying in the topsoil.” Howarth indicated the size of the thing with his hands. “Very unusual, which is what got Kirsty—that’s the digger I mentioned—so puzzled in the first place. She’d barely raked off anything else when she found black plastic. A sheet or a large strong bag. It was slightly ripped, and hair was protruding through the tear.”
“We’ll get her to supply the details.” Robin couldn’t shake off an instant, and uncharacteristically unprofessional, dislike he’d taken to this witness. “You said this was virgin ground, but if somebody buried a body, then the area must have been disturbed. Did nobody notice?”
Howarth shrugged. “That bit of ground’s been used for all sorts of things over the years, because people didn’t think it was important. There used to be a children’s play area there, but it was taken out. Health and Safety.” He rolled his eyes. “It’s been a right mess since then, so if somebody was careful enough, they could cover their tracks.”
“Hm. How easy is it to get into this place out of hours?”
“The main building’s locked and alarmed.” That made sense, given that the mosaics and hypocaust ruins were in great condition. Culford wasn’t Fishbourne, but it remained impressive. “The rest of the site just has a fence. We weren’t aware of anything that needed protecting.” Howarth gave Pru a rueful smile.
She returned the smile, then adopted her most professional air. “You’ll appreciate there are questions we’ll have to ask you, and statements to be taken, both now and as the details emerge. For a start, are you aware of anyone associated with the site going missing?”
Howarth shook his head. “No, all women accounted for.”
“How do you know it’s a woman we’re concerned with?” Robin interjected.
“Oh, sorry. Kirsty said she reckoned the corpse was female, from what she could see of the hair. Have I spoken out of turn?”
Robin narrowed his eyes. “We don’t make any assumptions about identifying the victim until we hear from our experts.”
“I apologise once more. Thing is, our staff here is predominantly female. We only have one paid employee, Clare, who runs the administration and just about everything else. She gets helped by volunteers so we can have the site open as much as possible.”
“I’ll get a full list of names from Clare, thank you. In the interim, I’d like to talk to the student who found the body. Kirsty, did you say?”
“That’s right. She’ll be up in the staffroom, which is our posh term for that Portakabin.” Howarth pointed towards a dingy green building. “Do you want to talk to her now?”
“After we check in at the scene. Thanks,” Robin added, remembering his manners.
“Shall I take you . . .?”
“No thanks, Charlie.” Pru cuffed his arm. “You’ll be busy enough putting off the school trips and the public. This place needs to be shut to everyone for the time being.”
Howarth’s face dropped. “Hell. I never thought. I’ll get onto it.”
As Robin and his sergeant made their way from the car park to where a white tent indicated the victim’s last resting place, he cast a glance over his shoulder. Howarth was on his phone, talking animatedly. “Is he always like that?”
“Like what, sir?”
“Gets up people’s noses and they can’t work out why.”
Pru laughed. “Yeah, that’s him. Or at least it is if you’re a bloke. They find him a bit smarmy.”
“And what’s he like with women?”
“A charmer. No harm in him, though. He’s always struck me as happily married.” They halted at the point where they’d have to slip on at least gloves and overshoes if they wanted to get closer to the shallow grave. “I suspect if a woman misread the charm and made him an offer, he’d run a mile.”
“Hmm.”
The appearance of Grace, emerging from the tent with a cheery wave, focussed their attention away from smarmy site directors towards the gruesome minutiae. “Coming over for a look, sir?”
“When we’re kitted up. Want us in bunny suits?”
“Please. Whole kit and caboodle. This isn’t Midsomer.” Grace had no time for television crime dramas and the way they played fast and loose with crime scenes and forensic matters. Shoddy procedures and the depiction of seemingly limitless budgets; both riled her. “The doctor has been, to say that she’s definitely dead. He’ll do the postmortem tomorrow.”
“How long has the body been there?” Robin asked once they were inside the tent and had their first glimpse of the corpse. The dismal sight of somebody’s child, somebody’s loved one, cut off in their prime was one Robin would never get used to.
Grace wrinkled her nose. “She’s been there months, rather than days. I’ll be able to give you a better answer when all the tests are done.”
“Definitely a she?” Pru clarified. She waited for Grace’s nod before continuing. “Any idea how old she was?”
“About twenties or thirties, from what I can see of the body and clothes. Although what I can expose has been restricted by the plastic she was wrapped in. We’ll confirm everything as soon as we can, along with cause of death and all the rest of it. I suspect she’s had blunt trauma to the forehead, but she’s in a pretty bad way. The doctor didn’t like the state of the bit of her face that’s visible.”
“Series of blows?”
Grace shrugged. “Can’t tell as yet. Maybe something that happened postmortem. When I know, you will.”
Robin, with a quickly hidden shudder, glanced at the dead woman again. “Do we have a name for her?”
“Not that I’ve found yet. But it’s going to be a slow process. Don’t want to miss anything by rushing.” Grace sighed. “Poor lass.”
“Poor lass, indeed.” Robin forced a rueful smile. “Get all the information you can. She deserves it.”
“I’ll do my best. And then we’ll see what Greg and his pals can make of it.”
“We’ll leave you to it.” The sooner Grace could collect the samples, the sooner they’d be off to the lab for examination.
Once they’d left the CSI to get on with her job and were heading off to find the digger who’d uncovered the body, Pru—pale faced—rubbed her hands as though ridding the grave dirt from them.
“First corpse?” Robin asked, not unkindly. Death took some getting used to.
“First murder, assuming it is a murder. Seen a couple of RTAs.” Thank God that was still the most likely way the local police came across dead bodies. “I imagined it would be the same.”
“But it isn’t?”
“No, and I can’t work out why.” She halted. “Ditch me if I’m being a sea anchor, sir. There must be some of the Abbotston team who’ve got more experience than I have.”
“There are. And they’ll have plenty to exercise that experience on, especially if there’s no ID on our victim. At least you didn’t puke all over your shoes, like Anderson did.”
“Did he?”
“Do you think I’m lying?” He was, but it wouldn’t hurt for her to believe the story for a while. “Fancy a cuppa? Your pal must be able to rustle us up one.”
“No, thanks.” They’d reached the Portakabin door. “He’d only try to find somebody with two X chromosomes to do it. He wouldn’t know one end of a kettle from another.”
Robin grinned, then immediately changed his expression for one suitably serious for interviewing a witness.
Kirsty—they guessed it was her from the name emblazoned on the back of her sweatshirt—was sitting at a table with what appeared to be a colleague. Both had their hands clenched around mugs which somehow looked far too large for them. The Portakabin was comfortably enough decked out, having—apart from the table and chairs—several more comfy armchairs, a sagging sofa, a tiny kitchenette, and another section which appeared to be set aside for the cleaning and sorting of artefacts. A couple of PCs, surprisingly modern, completed the contents. The windows provided a scenic view of the car park, which could be blocked out by blinds when the sight of school coaches and snotty pupils became overwhelming.
The inevitably edgy introductions were made, and Kirsty’s colleague, Abby, offered to make them all a fresh brew, which Robin readily accepted.
“Nothing like this has ever happened before,” Kirsty said, without being asked. “I mean, I’m used to turning up burials or cremations, especially on the edges of Roman sites, but I knew as soon as I saw it that this wasn’t old.”
“Can we take this from the beginning, please? Assume we don’t know a thing,” Robin said in what he hoped were soothing tones. The girl was clearly nervous, and some important element might be lost if they didn’t go through things logically.
“Okay.” Kirsty gave a little background to the dig, which matched what Howarth had said. She and Abby had arrived that morning as the advance guard of a team from Kinechester University, and they’d barely got a couple of inches down when they’d come to the mosaic.
“Where’s that now?” Pru enquired.
“In a finds tray, up by the trench. We lifted it whole, didn’t we, Abby?” she called across to where her colleague was doling teabags into a pot.
“We did.” Abby gestured with her teaspoon, miming the procedure. “After we’d recorded it and everything. It was obvious it wasn’t in situ, so we thought it must have been backfill from some previous dig we didn’t know anything about, or maybe from when they put the play park in.”
“Yes”—Kirsty nodded—“we knew before we started that the ground had been disturbed time and again, and who knows how careless people had been.”
Robin wasn’t sure that the contractors who put in or took out the play equipment would have been allowed to be so gung-ho with any artefacts they turned up, but he let it ride. “And then?”
“And then we cleared back a bit more and found the plastic. I wondered at first if it was from landscaping. You know, people put down black plastic to inhibit weeds. I made some stupid joke about how it wasn’t typically Anglo-Saxon or anything like that, and then I called Abby over. She spotted the tear in the bag and the hair sticking through, so she said we should leave everything as it was.”
“Quite right.” Pru smiled encouragingly. “Did you turn up any other finds before you shut digging down for the day?”
“No. We weren’t expecting to, given how little we’d got down into the soil. If the archaeology is at the same level as the villa, we’d have expected to go down another three feet.”
“Why didn’t you use a mechanical digger to take off the top layers?” Robin had seen that on Time Team too.
“Because we knew the top layers were likely to have already been disturbed and didn’t want to risk missing artefacts in the topsoil.” Abby brought over the steaming mugs of tea, to a chorus of gratitude. “Just as well, isn’t it?”
“Indeed.” Robin blew on his tea, then risked a semi-scalding sip. “Why didn’t you ring us? Protocol?”
“Lack of phone signal. You know what it’s like round here.” Kirsty, taking a draught, didn’t seem to notice how hot the tea was. Maybe she had it milky enough to counteract the heat. “I came down to the office, where Charlie was. Mr. Howarth. He came up to double-check, then went to ring you. You can get signal in here.”
“What did he double-check?” Pru asked.
The students rolled their eyes. “That we hadn’t made a mistake and misidentified a body that was too old to be of interest to you. As though the Romans used plastic.”
“I thought you had to report all bodies, unless they were found properly interred in a burial ground.” Pru looked to Robin, who both shrugged and nodded.
“Always best to call us in.” He took another sip of tea. “Have you any idea of who the dead woman might be?”
Abby and Kirsty shared a How the hell are we supposed to know? glance before shaking their heads.
“I know, it sounds a daft question.” Robin smiled. “But you’d be surprised. People hear things, about somebody who’s gone missing but not been reported to the police, or rumours about odd happenings. Office gossip that turns out to have a basis in truth.”
“Sorry.” Kirsty shook her head again. “Nothing.”
“That mosaic’s a bit off, though,” Abby remarked. “I took a picture of it to send to my tutor. She reckons it’s totally the wrong design and era for this site. She said it looked like a Victorian antiquarian might have hacked it out of somewhere else.”
“Seems fishy,” Robin agreed. “It was definitely on top of the sheeting? The dead woman couldn’t have been holding it in her hands or anything?”
“I doubt it.” Kirsty frowned. “Not unless the plastic had all been disturbed already.”
“Thank you.” Robin took another swig of tea. He’d never be able to manage the entire mug. “We’ll get a constable up here to take formal statements from you both, as well as anybody else who’s on-site. You’d think somebody would have seen or heard something suspicious.”
Abby snorted. “Don’t count on it. I can think of people in my department who’d notice a flint flake three metres away but not spot a bollard until they walked into it.”
“Let’s hope you’re wrong.” Robin had an awful feeling she wouldn’t be.
Chapter Two
Adam had just put the house phone down as Robin trudged through the front door. Campbell must have heard the approach of his “other” master well before Adam did, as he was ready and waiting to pounce.
“I wasn’t expecting you to be home so early,” Adam said, then gave his partner a kiss.
“Sorry about that. You’d better tell your sugar daddy to skedaddle.” Robin, dog in tow, edged towards the kitchen. “Was that him on the phone?”
“No. The usual ‘We’re from Microsoft and there’s something wrong with your computer.’ I always say, ‘Microsoft? That’s very interesting,’ then clam up. They panic and put the phone down.”
“Good tactic.” Robin yawned. “I told the team to make the most of this evening. Once we have an identification of the dead woman, it’ll be all hands to the deck.”
“Dinner won’t be long. Saturday’s chilli con carne from the freezer.”
“Sounds like heaven.” Robin kicked off his shoes. He’d texted earlier, from the site, to warn Adam a new investigation was afoot, although Adam had already guessed that was the case, as the incident had been on the local news feed. Once the folks from Culford villa had cancelled the school trip which was due the next day, and the characteristic blue-and-white police tape had appeared, word had spread.
“Want to talk about it?”
“Not a lot to say at present.” Robin stroked Campbell’s ears.
“What’s that on your sleeve?”
“Where?” Robin twisted about.
“Left elbow. Looks like oil. Or rust. Or both.”
“That’s because it is oil. Sod.”
“Take it off and I’ll put something on it. There’s a can of Stain Devil under the sink.”
Robin slid the jacket off, grimacing at the smear on what he’d always described as one of his favourite items of clothing. “This cost me a small fortune. Got it in a little shop down an alley in Bath.”
“No wonder it cost so much.” Adam started work on the stain. Little domestic tasks such as this formed part of the process of bringing them closer and keeping them together. It was like being a married couple, only not quite.
“That jacket’s almost as precious to me as Campbell, even if it’s never saved my life.” Robin peered over Adam’s shoulder. “I rubbed up against some rust bucket of a truck in Culford car park. Must have done it then.”
“No wonder the people on Time Team always look like they’ve borrowed their outfits off the local scarecrows. Perhaps it’s an occupational hazard.”
“Don’t you start. I feel like I’ve spent all day fending off daft ‘of course you’ve found a mosaic at a Roman site’ type quips.”
“Mosaic? There wasn’t anything about that on the news.” Adam, having performed first aid on the jacket, opened the fridge and pulled out a bottle of beer and one of sparkling water.
“Just the water, please. I’ll keep the beer for when I really need it. Thanks.” Robin took the bottle. “And yes, we’ve kept the mosaic quiet for the moment.”
He gave a résumé of what they’d found out about that morning: the ground-penetrating survey, the possible bathhouse, the university students beginning to dig.
Adam winced when he reached the part about finding the body. “Poor girls. Do you think it’s worse to find a fresh corpse or an old one? Or are they equally gruesome?”
“You should ask Pru Davis that. I thought she was going to lose her breakfast, although she held it together in the end. Anyway, this bit of mosaic was on top of the body, a whole section of it embedded in whatever Romans used to hold their tesserae. I suspect the archaeology mob is more puzzled about that than about the dead woman. Wrong era, wrong place, wrong everything.”
“Sounds odd.”
“Sounds bloody peculiar. And who knows how it links to the murder.”
“It’ll make sense in the end.” Adam began to plate up their food. “Like a jigsaw when you can’t see where a particular bit goes until you’ve got the ones that fit round it. Then you say, ‘Bloody hell, I never realised it went there!’”
Robin grinned. “Are you always so aggressive when you do jigsaws?”
Adam made a face. “You know what I mean. Ooh, and before I forget, your mum rang. Must have heard about the case on the news and knew you’d have your nose stuck in it.”
“You leave my nose alone.” Robin chuckled. “Mum says I’ve got a cute nose.”
“She’d say you had a cute nose if you were Cyrano de Bergerac, though, wouldn’t she? Mums do. Anyway, she sends her love, says she’ll be thinking of you and you’re not to work too hard.”
“Fat chance of that.”
They gave the next few minutes over to eating and preventing the dog from stealing anything from their plates.
“It’ll upset your tummy, young man,” Robin said, fending off a furry snout. “Basket. Go on.”
Campbell grudgingly obeyed, curling up in his basket with a mortally offended look on his face.
“You can have a biscuit in a minute if you’re good. You as well,” Adam added, turning to address Robin rather than the dog. “Sandra got in some Abernethys from Waitrose. And Bonios for ‘himself’.”
“I have no idea how I survived in the past without a cleaner cum Jill-of-all-trades to pander to my every biscuit whim.”
“Oi!” Adam snorted. “What about me? How did you survive without a handsome teacher in your life?”
“I’ve no bloody idea about that, either.” Robin scooped up the last bit of food from his plate with a satisfied sigh. “Good cook, good lover, sympathetic ear. What more could a man want?”
“A quick solution to this case?”
Robin blew out his cheeks. “Too true. Not sure we’ll get it, though. Nothing useful showed up on the initial trawl through missing-persons reports, despite the description we have. Grace says she’s a slim thing, size eight or ten, perhaps, and that the clothes are standard UK brands like White Stuff and Fat Face. Preliminary thoughts are that she isn’t a visitor from abroad. Auburn hair, seems natural.”
Adam cleared away the plates, then put the kettle on. “Now we’ve finished eating, can I ask whether she’s recognisable?”
Robin winced. “Grace has a feeling the body was originally not wrapped in plastic. Something got at the face and had a gnaw.”
“Ew.” Adam raised his hand. “I get the picture. Don’t say any more or you’ll put Campbell off his Bonio.”
“I’ll get him one while you make a cuppa.”
“Deal.” Everything seemed more manageable with a cup of tea in one’s hand. “You said, ‘originally.’ Was she reburied?”
“Seems like it. Grace’s guess is somewhere around six months ago, give or take a bit either way. That supports what the site administrator said—they had a Community Payback group in to weed and dig over some of the tattier parts of the site. That would have been best part of a year ago, and she wasn’t in the ground then.”
“May sort of time?” Adam nodded. “And leaving a nice turned-over piece of ground for somebody to make use of. Who’d notice another bit of disturbance?”
“Indeed. Especially out there. They’d think it was a fox or badger having a poke. Look at the mess Campbell can make if we let him.”
The dog raised his head at the sound of his name, clearly decided there was no food involved in the conversation, and snuggled back down again with the remains of his biscuit.
“What are your thoughts on the mosaic?” Adam asked.
“No thoughts, simply questions, like how it entered the scene. Has it always been with the body? Was it put in the second time, or just lying around in the topsoil and got interred by accident or what?” Robin watched as the dog nibbled his biscuit. “I’ve never seen a hound who eats so daintily when he wants to.”
“He’s smart. He’s learned it makes the food last longer.” Adam couldn’t help but smile at the two beings he valued most. Campbell could easily have been envious of Robin suddenly appearing in his master’s life, but from the start he’d been as besotted with the policeman as Adam had been. “Smart but sentimental.”
“Then he takes after you.”
“Guilty as charged.” Adam kept an old mobile phone upstairs, SIM card intact, because it had saved the last text his grandfather had ever sent him. When he’d first told Robin about it, they’d both been in tears— He should get back to talking about the murder, or he’d be getting sentimental again. “Why did nobody notice that the area had been disturbed twice?”
“It wasn’t necessarily disturbed twice. The body might have been somewhere else the first time and moved because Culford was a better spot. That’s up to Grace and her cronies to work out. I get the impression the area was overgrown and ignored. They’ve had to clear a mass of weeds already.”
Adam nodded. “If you’d enough nous to choose your spot behind a bush and pick your time, I suppose you could get away with murder. Sorry. Didn’t mean to sound flippant.”
“I know. We all use those expressions too casually.” Robin strolled over, put his arms round Adam’s waist, and leaned into his back. “Next few days are going to be busy. If I forget to say ‘I love you,’ you won’t forget that it’s a fact, will you?”
“I promise.” Adam, thoughts heading trouser-wards, caressed Robin’s hand before the arrival of a pair of massive paws and a cold, wet nose broke the romantic moment.
“Yes, and we both love you too.” Robin stroked Campbell’s head. “Now hop it to your basket so Daddy can give Daddy a kiss.”
Eventually the dog got the message, but the kiss had barely started before the unwelcome tones of Robin’s phone interrupted it.
“Oh, hell. Sorry.” Robin grabbed it off the breakfast bar and managed, “Hello?” before heading for the hall. It had to be work, given the snatches of conversation Adam could hear; developments on the case, no doubt. Chances were Robin would have to go in to work again, just as the evening was looking promising. Hopefully the traffic wouldn’t be too bad at this time of the day so he could make a swift journey there and back.
Commuting from their house in Lindenshaw to both Abbotston and Culdover was viable, albeit logic kept telling them that a move would reduce travelling time for both. With the money from the sale of Robin’s flat, they had a sizeable deposit to lay down on another property, although it would have to be exactly the right place to warrant selling up their Lindenshaw home, especially given the house’s history. It had belonged to Adam’s grandparents, and it had been the site of all the significant moments in their romance, even when it hadn’t been an actual romance, simply an illicit longing between detective and witness.
Didn’t people reckon that moving house was a stressful experience at the best of times? So shouldn’t any potential move have to be worthwhile? And, of course, any prospective property would have to pass the most stringent of tests, specifically that of Campbell, who’d need to sniff every bush and tree in the garden to assess its suitability for leg cocking. And the residents of Lindenshaw wouldn’t appreciate having their favourite hound—much petted and fussed over by locals when he was taken out for walks—being relocated to a place where other lucky so-and-sos would be able to ruffle his fur and have his wet nose stuck on their legs.
“Sorry about that.” Robin’s reappearance in the kitchen roused Adam from his thoughts.
“You really don’t need to apologise about work calls any more than I do about the interminable marking and planning. It goes with the job.” Adam wrinkled his nose. “Time for that cuppa before you go?”
“Go?” Robin frowned. “Oh, no, this can wait until morning. We’ve had a report of a missing archaeologist. Right sort of age, although not from this area. London. Somebody saw the story on the BBC news website, remembered the lass disappearing, and got in touch. I’ll have to go up there, assuming that a more local or viable connection doesn’t turn up.”
Adam nodded. “I guess it’s dangerous to assume this poor lass is anything to do with Culdover.”
“I wish you’d tell that to some of the constables at Abbotston. Two plus two always makes five for them.” Robin, sighing, rubbed his eyes. “I hate it when there’s no identification. I’m going to double- and triple-check what we know about the missing woman against what we know about the corpse. Imagine if we go up there and spook her family and it turns out it’s not her?”
“God, that would be awful. They must be twitching each time the phone rings or the doorbell goes. Like she dies again every day, if that makes any sense.” Adam poured the tea—they needed it more than ever. “How can so many people simply go missing?”
Robin shrugged. “They’re not all abducted by loonies, certainly. Some of them must take ill and die when they’re miles from nowhere and don’t turn up for months or years. Thanks.”
They took their drinks and the packet of biscuits into the lounge.
“That can’t be many people, though, can it? To go unfound for so long? Britain isn’t exactly full of unpopulated areas.”
“True, but it does happen. More likely they decide to go off somewhere for whatever reason.”
“Made a break for freedom?” Adam, having got himself comfortable on the sofa, and Campbell comfortable—if a touch peeved—on the floor, managed to open the biscuit packet without too much damage to the contents and without intervention from black canine noses.
“Could be. People are complex. They do illogical things because it seems like a good idea at the time.” Robin dunked his biscuit for the required amount of time, then ate it with evident pleasure. “Maybe it gets to the point you can’t face returning home because of all the fuss and the shame, so you stay put and it just gets worse with every day that passes.”
Good point. Putting off dealing with matters only made them worse, and it would surely get to the stage where it made them impossible. “What if she’s missing and hasn’t been reported, though? That happens, doesn’t it?”
“It does.” Robin’s brow puckered. “Even in these days of social media overkill and constant communication, people quietly disappear or are made to disappear. If this girl was here illegally, we might have the devil’s own job of finding out who she is—was—despite doing facial reconstructions. The fact that she had no ID suggests somebody didn’t want her name coming to light in the event that her body did.”
“Unless she was killed in a robbery that went wrong. Purse and whatever taken for their contents as opposed to anything else.”
“True, oh genius.” Robin took another swig of tea. “They host lots of school trips at Culford, I understand.”
“Yeah. Most of the Culdover schools use the place for trips, and there’s an activity centre near Tythebarn that always takes the kids over for a day.”
“Ever taken your class there?”
“No. Culdover Primary uses it for a year four visit, but Lindenshaw never utilised the place, I’m afraid. Too infra dig, if you’ll excuse the pun. Oh.” The penny dropped. “I get it. You want to know if I have a connection to this case too.”
“Well, I have to ask.” Robin grinned sheepishly. “Just promise me you won’t let yourself get involved this time.”
“You make it sound as though I deliberately try to. I don’t. Your cases want to embroil me no matter how much I attempt to keep out of things.”
Campbell opened one sleepy eye, as though agreeing that Robin’s murder investigations seemed to want to involve them all, him included.
“If you do end up finding you have a connection to Culford, I’m not sure if I’ll want to know. Even if it turns out you dropped a ring pull in the play area and it has your fingerprints on it.”
“You can count that out, for a start. I visited the villa when I was a boy, but I’ve not been there since, and I don’t think any ring pull would be mine. Mum would have killed me if she’d caught me dropping litter. And I didn’t see anyone burying a body.” Adam paused a moment, feigning deep thought. “No teachers of my acquaintance gone missing, either.”
“Pillock.” Robin slapped his arm. “You never went out with any archaeologists? Sat on a committee with one? Did jury service when one was on trial?”
Adam rolled his eyes at the reference to two of Robin’s previous cases, both of which had been a bit too close to home. Even before they met, they’d both derided those television shows where friends of the detective—or his daughter, in one case—were always linked to the corpse or the suspects. Neither had dreamed that could apply in real life, but Robin’s two recent murder cases had disproved that, although technically that connection had been the outcome of the first case. Still, random events clustered, didn’t they? So hopefully they’d had their cluster and could move on safely.
Adam hadn’t expected that murder would never cross their paths again, given Robin’s job and the fact that the villages of England were as full of jealousy and other fiery emotions as the cities. And the prevalence of legitimately held and used shotguns—or golf clubs or any other potential implements of death—gave means as well as motive or opportunity. Probably easier to hide a body, welcome to that, which was just what this case showed.
“No, no, and thrice no. I swear,” he replied at last, hoping that vow wouldn’t come back to haunt him. He’d seen one dead body and was in no hurry to repeat the experience.
“Right.” Robin grabbed another biscuit and held it in mid-air, pre-dunk. “Not another word about this case until we have some proper evidence to go on. And what’s so funny?”
“Sorry.” Adam managed to get the word out despite the laughter. “You reminded me of an old joke. The one about all the loos being stolen from the cop shop, so the police had nothing to go on.”
“I’ll give you bloody nothing to go on.” Robin laid down both mug and undunked biscuit, pounced at Adam, and tickled him mercilessly down the sides of his ribs.
“Hey! Stop! You’ll spill my tea.”
“That’s not all that will spill if I get my way.”
“Promises, promises.” Adam put his mug on the table. Might as well take advantage of the offer because who knew when they’d have the chance again? Murders meant long hours, late nights, and knackered policemen whose thoughts were too tired to descend to their pants. He leaned in for a smacker of a kiss.
“That was good. For starters.” Robin’s lascivious grin could have turned the iciest libido to butter. “What about—”
Once more Robin’s phone interrupted them.
“Sorry,” he said, picking it up off the table.
“I told you to stop saying that.” Adam forced a grin. A second call so hard on the heels of the first couldn’t be good news and surely meant Robin’s return to the station.
“Oh, hi.” Robin halted halfway to the door. “How’s life?” Not the station, by the sound of it. “Yes, if we can. Depends what it is.” Robin turned to mouth what looked like the name “Anderson.” Hopefully this was just a social call from his old sergeant that could soon be dealt with, letting them get back to the matter in hand.
“Bloody hell!” Robin sat down heavily in the armchair. “When? Why?”
Adam, infuriated at only hearing half the conversation, helped himself to a consolatory biscuit. The worried expression on Robin’s face and the way he’d settled into his chair suggested he was in for the long haul. As it turned out, though, the call was surprisingly short, with Robin saying, “Okay, I think that’ll be all right, so long as it’s short term,” then making a helpless gesture at Adam.
“What the hell’s going on?” Adam mouthed, but his partner simply gritted his teeth and rolled his eyes. Things must be bad.
“I guess you got that was Anderson,” Robin said after the call ended.
“Yeah. Sounded ominous, whatever it was.”
“It is. Helen’s chucked him out.”
“What?” Stuart Anderson had been living with his teacher girlfriend for years, and everyone at Stanebridge seemed to regard them as an old married couple, even if they hadn’t actually tied the knot. Although Robin always said he wouldn’t have been amazed if it turned out they’d been married years ago, and Anderson hadn’t mentioned the fact to any of his workmates. Helen never wearing a wedding ring seemed to argue against that, though. “What’s he done?”
“According to him, he didn’t do anything. She’s been edgy for days, and this evening it all exploded.” Robin retrieved his tea, took a sip, then winced. It had no doubt turned tepid. “She says he can pack a bag and hit the road.”
“But surely she gave some sort of explanation?”
“Apparently, she said that if he didn’t know what he’d done, she wasn’t going to tell him.”
“Ouch.” Adam gave Campbell, who looked distressed at the goings-on, a conciliatory pat. “What a mess. What’s he going to do? Ah.” The sheepish expression on Robin’s face answered the question. “He’s staying here, isn’t he? Presumably he cadged a bed, seeing as I didn’t hear you offer.”
“You should be a detective.” Robin patted his arm. “He hasn’t got any family around here, and I suspect we’re the people he trusts most, in this area. It’ll only be for a few days until he sorts himself out.”
“Or works out what he’s done and apologises for it?” Adam remembered the penultimate assembly he’d attended at Lindenshaw school, how it had centred on the Good Samaritan; that’s how they were being called to act. “I’d better get the spare bed ready. You can find him some towels.”
Robin started to clear away the remains of their tea and biscuits. “Sorry about our romantic night in being spoiled.”
“You can make it up to me when he’s gone or when the murder’s solved. Whichever comes first. Hopefully the former.” Adam halted halfway out of the lounge door. “What does he eat for breakfast?”
“Whatever we put in front of him. Beggars can’t be choosers.”
Beggars. Adam shivered. “Maybe that’s how it started with your dead woman. Row with the other half, or with her parents. Sofa surfing until her mates got fed up with it. Nobody realised she’d slipped out of the loop until it was too late.”
“Now who’s putting two and two together and getting five?” Robin edged over to give him a hug, encumbered by mugs and plate—and a dog that wanted to be involved—but a hug nonetheless. “We won’t let him end up on the streets.”
“Good. Only I wouldn’t want him to end up living here permanently, either. I mean, he’s a nice bloke and all that, but three’s a crowd. Four . . .” he added, glancing at Campbell.
Robin grinned. “Yeah. Better get practicing our relationship advice.”
A Party of Murder by John Inman
Chapter One
FROM THE passenger seat, Jamie Roma slipped a hand under the shirttail of the man driving the car. He chuckled to himself when the car swerved off the road, then lurched back onto the asphalt in a spray of gravel and mud.
Derek Lee growled through what Jamie considered to be the sexiest pair of lips he had ever seen in his life. “Jesus, if that hand had gone into my pants, we’d be dead now.”
“Dead but happy,” Jamie whispered back.
Derek made a sound that was somewhere between a groan and a chuckle. Mostly, Jamie figured, it was a groan. Jamie didn’t mind not getting a laugh at his feeble joke, because at the same time as he was groaning, Derek was also tucking his own hand under his shirt and stroking Jamie’s fingers.
They were motoring across the high desert thirty miles outside San Diego. Even had there been daylight, there would have been nothing to see but rolling hills, a bunch of boulders scattered around like spilled Legos, and about a gazillion clumps of sagebrush. As it was, they couldn’t even see that because darkness had fallen with a resounding thud about three hours back. And now not only was it night, it was a moonless and starless night, thanks to the rain clouds that had been forming overhead all day. If not for the Toyota’s headlights and the gleam of the GPS system on the dashboard, they would have been floundering through a sea of bottomless black shadow—blind, directionless, lost.
It was also lonely. They hadn’t seen another car for ages.
Jamie jumped, pointing through the windshield at a sudden twitch of movement up ahead on the side of the road. “Lookie! A coyote!”
No sooner had he cried out than the animal froze, every ounce of its attention trained on the approaching car. The coyote’s eyes were like teeny tiny flashlights, beaming straight back at them. The beast didn’t run; it didn’t cower; it simply stood there with its front feet on the road and its rear end in the bushes, waiting patiently for the car to speed past so it could go on about its business.
“It’s not afraid of us,” Jamie said.
“Why should it be?” Derek snorted. “It’s not the one that’s lost. And don’t say ‘Lookie.’ You sound like a three-year-old.”
Jamie slapped Derek’s arm at the exact moment he spun around in his seat to look behind them as the car zoomed past the coyote. For the briefest of moments, he spotted the creature flashing to life in the red glow of the car’s taillights. Then the animal melted into the receding darkness as if it had never been there at all. Jamie swung back around and replaced his hand on Derek’s bare belly.
He sighed.
“What’s with the sigh?” Derek asked.
“Nothing. Just happy.”
“You’re not getting romantic, are you?”
It was Jamie’s turn to snort. “I don’t get romantic. I’m just a guy who’s having fun driving along with his oldest friend in the world who happens to be an occasional trick.”
“Occasional as in every single night for the last two months.”
“Well, yeah.”
“After all these years of friendly abstinence together, we suddenly jump into bed and pork like bunny rabbits for eight solid weeks.”
“Pork like bunny rabbits. What a lovely expression. Rates right up there with fuck your balls off.”
“Oh hush. I wonder how it happened.”
“How what happened?”
“How we ended up in bed together that first night.”
Jamie gave Derek time to think about it while he enjoyed the sensation of exploring Derek’s tight little belly button with a fingertip. “Hormones, I guess,” Derek finally said. “Horny, humpy hormones.”
This time when Jamie groaned, it was a real one. “Yeah. And tequila. Lots and lots of tequila. My head still hurts.”
“How about your ass?”
“That too. But in a good way. And that’s from last night, not two months ago.”
They laughed, and Derek stroked Jamie’s hand again, making Jamie’s laugh ratchet down to a dreamy little smile. He couldn’t see it on his own face because he was too lazy to look in the visor mirror, but he knew it was there all the same. It was somewhat worrisome, too, that dreamy, contemplative smile he could feel twitching on his lips. My God, what if he was beginning to feel romantic about Derek? What would that do to their lifelong friendship?
“We met in fifth grade,” Jamie said, pondering out loud.
Derek cracked the window to get some air into the car. Either the night had grown warmer, or he was having a hot flash. He realized, of course, that Jamie’s roving fingers so close to his groin might have something to do with that. “I know. I was there. You tried to steal my milk. Hmm,” he hummed, sticking his nose through the crack, “smell that night air.”
Jamie rolled his own window down, letting in a blast of air that made his hair thrash around on top his head. He stuck his face through the opening, squinting into the night. “Smells like a monsoon coming!” he yelled into the empty countryside.
“They don’t have monsoons in California!” Derek bellowed. “And get back in here. You look like a Rottweiler hanging out a car door with his tongue flapping in the wind.”
Jamie dragged himself back inside. He was grinning like an idiot, hair going every which way. Batting his eyelashes, he leaned against his seat belt and laid his head on Derek’s shoulder. “Ooh, if I was a Rottweiler, we could do it doggy style.”
Derek laughed. “And break every law of nature there is. You’re impossible.”
A sudden flash of lightning sizzled across the sky in front of them, making them both jump. A moment later, fat raindrops began pelting the windshield. Derek switched on the wipers. Soon their comforting song filled the interior of the car. Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh. It was a pleasant sound, Jamie thought. With his head still snuggled against Derek’s shoulder, Jamie returned his hand to Derek’s bare belly. His fingers twiddled idly with the hair around Derek’s navel. Both men grew quiet as they watched the road in front of them darken with rain.
“Any idea where we are?” Jamie asked.
With his lips in Jamie’s hair, Derek gave a good-natured growl. “Oh ye of little faith. I know exactly where we are.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere north of Mexico and south of the Bering Strait.”
“Very funny.”
Derek tapped the GPS monitor on the dashboard. “Honestly. We’re right where we’re supposed to be. See? There should be a turnoff coming up soon, and a few miles after that, a bridge. We’ll cross the bridge and continue on down a gravel side road for fifteen miles or so, and that will lead us unveeringly toward the house we’re trying to find.”
“So you hope,” Jamie drawled.
To which Derek didn’t quibble. “Yes. So I hope.”
For the space of about fifteen seconds, the rain came down so hard that even the windshield wipers couldn’t keep up. The sound was deafening. The downpour pummeled the car, almost stripping Jamie’s breath away. Being a Southern California boy, Jamie was more accustomed to drought. He didn’t like storms. When the rain eased up a little, his blood pressure dropped. He tried to relax. Through the streaming windshield, he could see the empty highway stretching out before them, disappearing into the rainy, wind-tossed distance. Derek tapped his index finger against the steering wheel. Clearly he was about to say something important. Which he finally did.
“I know we’ve been over this a dozen times, but I still don’t understand why we both received invitations to a house party from someone we don’t know.”
“From someone we assume we don’t know,” Jamie corrected. “Since the invitations weren’t signed, we really don’t know if we’re acquainted with the person who sent them or not. Personally, I think it’s some idiot friend of ours.”
“But we don’t know that for sure,” Derek pointed out. “And still, Jamie Roma, you putz, you insisted we come anyway.”
Jamie laughed. “Because it’s an adventure! It’s a lark. It’s mysterious. It’s a weekend house party in the middle of nowhere, fifty miles out of the city, cut off from the world, and being hosted by someone we may or may not know for reasons we haven’t got a clue about. Besides, at the bottom of the invitations they promised heart-stopping door prizes. Quote, unquote. Who could say no to heart-stopping door prizes?”
“Anybody with brains!” Derek snarled. “I’ve seen horror movies that start this way. While we’re tooling down this spookyass, rain-drenched highway heading straight into the maw of oblivion with thunder and lightning crashing and flashing all around us, I can imagine the opening credits of a really gory slasher movie unscrolling over our heads as we speak. Jamie and Derek on the Highway to Hell. Three for the Road with Jamie, Derek, and Leatherface. Queers on Elm Street.”
“That’s quite an imagination you’ve got there. Listen. Have I ever steered you wrong before?”
“Oh please, Jamie. When have you ever not steered me wrong? Remember that Mexican restaurant you wanted to try last week? The one where the cockroach crawled out of my taco?”
“You should have had a burrito.”
Derek ignored that. “I wonder how many guests there will be.”
“Like I care. Let’s just hope the booze doesn’t run out.” Jamie perked up. “Suppose there will be tequila?”
This time Derek’s groan came from the heart. “Oh God, I hope not. One shot of tequila and you end up with your legs in the air, toes pointed straight at the ceiling.”
“Why, thank you.”
Derek laughed. “No, thank you.”
Derek took their lives in his hands by leaning into the darkness and planting a kiss on Jamie’s eagerly expectant mouth. At the same time, their lives were further imperiled when Jamie’s fingers diddled their way south, burrowing under the buckle of Derek’s belt, which he cleverly unclasped with a flick of his thumb. Houdini couldn’t have done it better.
The car swerved again when Jamie wiggled out from under his shoulder harness and lowered his head to Derek’s lap. Rooting around with his nose like a hog hunting truffles, he unearthed exactly what he was searching for, and for the next three miles, not a word was spoken between the two.
The silence was finally broken when Derek stiffened all over and gripped the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles went white. Far beyond his ability to do anything about it, his hips lurched upward and he emitted a delicious moan.
“That’s my boy,” Jamie mumbled, smiling. “Let it go. And try not to run us off a cliff when you do.”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Derek gasped, once again lifting his ass off the seat until there was a good six inches of daylight showing beneath him—if there had been any daylight available on this miserably stormy night. While a brand-new onslaught of rain and wind pummeled the car and rocked it back and forth, he clutched a fistful of Jamie’s hair with the one free hand he dared take off the wheel.
For the next thirty seconds or so, Jamie Roma worked just as hard as the windshield wipers—trying desperately to stay ahead of the deluge.
TEN MINUTES later, Derek’s clothes were once again buttoned, zipped, and properly tucked into place, thanks to a little help from Jamie, who proved to be equally adept at getting Derek dressed in the cramped front seat of the car as he was in getting him undressed. With his heart still thumping in his ears and feeling smugly self-satisfied now that Jamie had had his way with him, which was what Derek had hoped for all along, he repositioned himself comfortably behind the steering wheel and drove on through the pounding rain.
Beside him, Jamie—also licking his lips but for different reasons—leaned forward and squinted through the rainwater sluicing down the windshield. He instantly gave a whoop.
“There’s the turnoff!” he cried, grabbing the dashboard. “Right there. Don’t miss it. Turn! Turn!”
Derek jumped in response and banged his head on the roof of the car. Then he slammed on the brakes, all but strangling them both against their seat belts. The car jolted to a stop in a mudhole the size of Lake Tahoe. Outside, the rain had turned to hail. It clattered off the hood and pounded on the metal roof while Derek stared out, bug-eyed, at what lay ahead. He glanced at Jamie, and in the glow from the dash lights, saw the look of horror on Jamie’s face. He was pretty sure that same horror was plastered all over his own puss. And why wouldn’t it be? After all, the situation, the night, and especially the road ahead, looked far from promising. To say the least.
They both peered intently forward, studying the terrain.
What was labeled a county road that appeared perfectly respectable meandering its way across the map on the GPS monitor was in reality little more than two muddy ruts awash in the storm. Those ruts wove their way toward a wind-tossed wilderness of trees—some pine, some deciduous and bare. They were etched into stark relief by an occasional stab of lightning sizzling across the heavens above.
“Think this is where the Donner party got lost?” Derek mumbled under his breath.
“Don’t be silly. Just keep driving,” Jamie said. “What have we got to lose?”
“I shudder to think,” Derek answered, but he did as directed and drove on anyway.
The road was rent with washboards and potholes, and muddy water splashed all the way up to the door handles as they bumped and lunged their way along. If not for their seat belts, they would have had their brains bashed out on the roof of the car. The chassis of the vehicle squeaked and creaked beneath them, complaining every inch of the way, and Derek wondered if his poor old Toyota would survive the journey at all.
After several minutes of this, while rain and hail pelted them from above and gale-force winds jostled them from the side, Jamie leaned forward and, with his hot breath steaming the windshield in front of him, cried out, “There’s the bridge!”
Once again, Derek slammed on the brakes. This time the car slued sideways. It sloshed to a stop, still hanging on to the narrow roadway without sliding off into the bracken on either side.
Derek was just beginning to wonder if Jamie’s fingernails were leaving claw marks on his faux-leather dashboard when he decided to lean forward and study what lay ahead, hoping to come up with a game plan on how to proceed. With help from the headlights and an occasional explosion of lightning, he got a pretty good idea what they were up against, and it wasn’t encouraging.
Tucked in among the pine trees, the contraption that had the audacity to call itself a bridge squatted there in front of them in all its rustic splendor. In truth, it was merely a one-lane clapboard affair with no visible metal framework or overhead support beams and no railings on either side. Rickety, wooden, poorly constructed, the bridge looked like a death trap gleefully waiting for the next two gay boys to come along so it could snatch them into a premature and entirely unprepared-for afterlife.
“Is that thing safe?” Derek asked through squeaky, tight lips. “It doesn’t look safe. Do you think it’s safe?”
“Like I know,” Jamie all but snarled, clearly not optimistic.
In a momentary lull in the downpour, while the precipitation once again shifted from hail to rain—which in Derek’s opinion was a step in the right direction—he cocked his head to the side and breathed, “Listen!” For the space of half a dozen heartbeats they sat frozen in place, staring out the windshield. The air around them was alive with the sounds of the storm above their heads.
“If this rain keeps up,” Derek said, “it could cause a flash flood in the arroyo under the bridge.”
Jamie groaned. “Great. Could the water get high enough to wash the bridge away?”
“I don’t know.”
Jamie tried again. “Well, if we get across and the bridge is washed away behind us, is there a way for us to get back to where we started?”
“You mean back to the city?”
“Yeah. Back to the city.”
Derek punched a few buttons on the GPS monitor, scanning the maps that popped up, tracing the lines depicting roadways with a trembling fingertip.
Finally he said, “No. If we cross this bridge, there’s no way back, not on any sort of marked road at any rate.”
“And if we don’t cross the bridge, we’ll miss the party. Not to mention having driven all this way for nothing.”
“What are you doing?” Derek asked. “Weighing our lives against the possibility of free booze and door prizes?”
Jamie turned to him, his face suddenly lit with a familiar glimmer of mischief. It was his “it’s Saturday night, let’s get rowdy and raise hell, screw the consequences, I’ve got bail money” look. Derek knew it well.
“Well, yeah,” Jamie patiently explained. “What other criteria do you need?”
“I’m vaguely appalled by that devil-may-care light in your eyes,” Derek drawled. He tore his gaze from Jamie’s sexy grin and back to the bridge in front of them. “Almost as appalled as I am by the prospect of driving over that ricketyass bridge. Think the other guests got across already?”
Jamie thought about that for a minute. “Actually, we don’t even know if there are any other guests.”
“You’re right,” Derek agreed. “We don’t. What sort of idiots accept a party invitation in the middle of nowhere when they don’t know who sent the invitation or how many guests will be there when they arrive?”
“Idiots like us. I say we go for it. Cross the bridge.”
“What if it collapses?”
Jamie gave a dismissive wave at the structure in front of them. “Oh pshaw. It looks like it’s been standing for a couple of centuries already. What are the odds of it collapsing tonight at the exact moment we’re scurrying across?”
Derek chewed on the inside of his jaw. “I hate it when you say pshaw. It sounds so bucolic.”
“I’m a bucolic sort of guy.”
“No, you’re not. You’re a citified wimp! But you’re right. Statistically, if the bridge has withstood the elements this long, it should be safe enough for the next two minutes.”
“Exactly. And we definitely need to get where we’re going, because I could really use a drink right now. If this party is hosted by teetotalers, I’m going to be extremely upset. Cross the fucking bridge.”
“You’re crazy.”
Jamie shrugged. “So are you. Cross the bridge.”
“We should have packed our own booze.”
“You’re right, but it’s too late now. Oh wait, look up ahead. What’s that tucked in among the brambles and the blackberry bushes? Can it be? It is! It’s a liquor store!”
There was nothing ahead but trees and mud and rain. “You’re being sarcastic, aren’t you?”
“Who me? Cross the bridge.”
Derek slipped the car into Drive. “If we die, thanks for the blowjob.”
“No, thank you,” Jamie innocently beamed, licking his lips.
And with both men holding their breath, Derek floored the car and sailed out across the bridge.
Still holding their breath a moment later, they came to a sloshing, jolting stop inside a foot-deep mudhole on the far side. They turned to peer through the rear window. In the red glow of taillights, the wooden structure gave a shudder, then seemed to settle.
“See,” Jamie said. “We’re fine.”
As if his words had conjured disaster out of thin air, there came a horrific grinding, tumbling, rushing noise that seemed to be churning its way up from the depths of the earth itself. A surge of dark water poured down the arroyo and dashed against the side of the bridge. With a heave upward amid a tiny explosion of splintered timbers, the bridge collapsed in upon itself and disappeared without a trace. One second it was there, the next it was gone, washed away in the churning flood below.
“Well, poop,” Jamie whispered in the sudden silence. His eyes, Derek noticed, were as big as dinner plates.
Less than eagerly, they turned back to study the muddy, rutted path ahead. The storm had sprinkled it with evergreen bows and pine cones ripped from the living trees. The trees themselves appeared beaten down and half stripped bare, their heads bowed in the gusting wind. Fighting to stand upright against the onslaught, they shook and thrashed on both sides of the road. Derek didn’t want to think about what might be lurking among the spookyass shadows between their battered trunks. He forced his attention dead ahead at the disappearing roadway weaving a winding narrow mud-holed path through the trees toward a stormy, uncertain distance.
“This had better be a damn good party,” Derek muttered.
Jamie grunted in agreement. Terse for Jamie, Derek thought, who usually blathered on endlessly about everything. With Jamie’s fingers tightening on his thigh, Derek tapped the accelerator enough to urge the car slowly forward into that nightmarish tunnel burrowing its way between the trees ahead. The car rocked and lurched as they sloshed and splashed and squelched along, sinking hubcap-deep into every rain-glutted pothole they passed.
Derek decided on the spot that the only enjoyable part of this miserable night was having Jamie at his side to suffer through it with him. Creeped out by the storm and the collapsing bridge and the wind and the spooky, shadowy trees, Derek was nevertheless vaguely astounded by how much he enjoyed having Jamie with him. After all, Jamie was just a friend, although there was no denying they had suddenly slipped into the realm of fuckbuddydom lately. So what did that mean exactly? Did it mean Jamie had suddenly become something more than a friend?
Dumb question.
Derek allowed a smile to play at the corners of his mouth as he drove down the miserable, bumpy cow path. He glanced down at Jamie’s hand still resting on his thigh, and his smile widened.
“Don’t worry,” he softly said. “We’ll be fine.”
Jamie didn’t speak, but his fingers tightened on Derek’s leg, and that was answer enough.
Turning his attention back to the road, Derek drove on through the storm. Comforted by Jamie’s touch, he hummed a quiet song deep in his throat to the rhythm of the whooshing wiper blades.
With hail still clattering across the roof of the car and the bridge now washed out behind them, he suddenly wondered what the heck he was humming about.
He also began to wonder—all kidding aside—if they’d really be fine at all.
Davidson King, always had a hope that someday her daydreams would become real-life stories. As a child, you would often find her in her own world, thinking up the most insane situations. It may have taken her awhile, but she made her dream come true with her first published work, Snow Falling.
When she's not writing you can find her blogging away on Diverse Reader, her review and promotional site. She managed to wrangle herself a husband who matched her crazy and they hatched three wonderful children.
If you were to ask her what gave her the courage to finally publish, she'd tell you it was her amazing family and friends. Support is vital in all things and when you're afraid of your dreams, it will be your cheering section that will lift you up.
CS Poe
C.S. Poe is a Lambda Literary and EPIC award finalist author of gay mystery, romance, and paranormal books.
She is a reluctant mover and has called many places home in her lifetime. C.S. has lived in New York City, Key West, and Ibaraki, Japan, to name a few. She misses the cleanliness, convenience, and limited-edition gachapon of Japan, but she was never very good at riding bikes to get around.
She has an affinity for all things cute and colorful and a major weakness for toys. C.S. is an avid fan of coffee, reading, and cats. She’s rescued two cats—Milo and Kasper do their best on a daily basis to sidetrack her from work.
C.S. is a member of the International Thriller Writers organization.
Her debut novel, The Mystery of Nevermore, was published by DSP Publications, 2016.
Olivier Bosman
Born to Dutch parents and raised in Colombia and England, I am a rootless wanderer with itchy feet. I've spent the last few years living and working in The Netherlands, Czech Republic, Sudan and Bulgaria, but I have every confidence that I will now finally be able to settle down among the olive groves of Andalucia.
I'm an avid reader and film fan and I have an MA in creative writing for film and television.
Charlie Cochrane
Happily married, with a house full of daughters, Charlie tries to juggle writing with the rest of a busy life. She loves reading, theatre, good food and watching sport. Her ideal day would be a morning walking along a beach, an afternoon spent watching rugby and a church service in the evening.
John Inman
John has been writing fiction for as long as he can remember. Born on a small farm in Indiana, he now resides in San Diego, California where he spends his time gardening, pampering his pets, hiking and biking the trails and canyons of San Diego, and of course, writing. He and his partner share a passion for theater, books, film, and the continuing fight for marriage equality. If you would like to know more about John, check out his website.
When she's not writing you can find her blogging away on Diverse Reader, her review and promotional site. She managed to wrangle herself a husband who matched her crazy and they hatched three wonderful children.
If you were to ask her what gave her the courage to finally publish, she'd tell you it was her amazing family and friends. Support is vital in all things and when you're afraid of your dreams, it will be your cheering section that will lift you up.
C.S. Poe is a Lambda Literary and EPIC award finalist author of gay mystery, romance, and paranormal books.
She is a reluctant mover and has called many places home in her lifetime. C.S. has lived in New York City, Key West, and Ibaraki, Japan, to name a few. She misses the cleanliness, convenience, and limited-edition gachapon of Japan, but she was never very good at riding bikes to get around.
She has an affinity for all things cute and colorful and a major weakness for toys. C.S. is an avid fan of coffee, reading, and cats. She’s rescued two cats—Milo and Kasper do their best on a daily basis to sidetrack her from work.
C.S. is a member of the International Thriller Writers organization.
Her debut novel, The Mystery of Nevermore, was published by DSP Publications, 2016.
Born to Dutch parents and raised in Colombia and England, I am a rootless wanderer with itchy feet. I've spent the last few years living and working in The Netherlands, Czech Republic, Sudan and Bulgaria, but I have every confidence that I will now finally be able to settle down among the olive groves of Andalucia.
I'm an avid reader and film fan and I have an MA in creative writing for film and television.
As Charlie Cochrane couldn't be trusted to do any of her jobs of choice - like managing a rugby team - she writes. Her favourite genre is gay fiction, predominantly historical romances/mysteries, but she's making an increasing number of forays into the modern day. She's even been known to write about gay werewolves - albeit highly respectable ones.
Her Cambridge Fellows series of Edwardian romantic mysteries were instrumental in seeing her named Speak Its Name Author of the Year 2009. She’s a member of both the Romantic Novelists’ Association and International Thriller Writers Inc.
John has been writing fiction for as long as he can remember. Born on a small farm in Indiana, he now resides in San Diego, California where he spends his time gardening, pampering his pets, hiking and biking the trails and canyons of San Diego, and of course, writing. He and his partner share a passion for theater, books, film, and the continuing fight for marriage equality. If you would like to know more about John, check out his website.
Davidson King
EMAIL: davidsonkingauthor@yahoo.com
CS Poe
KOBO / FB GROUP / GOOGLE PLAY / B&N
EMAIL: contact@cspoe.com
Olivier Bosman
Charlie Cochrane
EMAIL: cochrane.charlie2@googlemail.com
John Inman
iTUNES / GOOGLE PLAY / AMAZON
Snow Falling by Davidson King
Anarchy by Olivier Bosman
B&N / KOBO / BOOKS2READ
Two Feet Under by Charlie Cochrane
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