BURY ME DEEP an utterly gripping crime thriller with an epic twist (Detective Rozlyn Priest Book 1) JANE ADAMS (fox in socks read aloud TXT) 📖

“I’m not,” Rozlyn told him, heat in her voice. “And as to the other business, we’ve got a driver and a receiver. Sweet F.A.”

“And, like I said: immigration will take it from there. That’s their business. We’ve bloody well done our bit. I’ll make sure you get credit due if that’s what’s bothering you and, speaking of which, I’ve arranged a nice little press briefing for you tomorrow morning.”

“Oh, good of you to tell me.”

“I’m telling you now, aren’t I? Take my advice and let the rest drop. When immigration find our Mr T. Thompson, I’ll make sure you get to ask him where he got his sense of the theatrical from.” He winked and strode off, leaving Rozlyn feeling frustrated and oddly sullied by his comments.

“Hey,” Rozlyn shouted after him. “What about Mouse Man. Someone damn near killed him. You going to dismiss that too?”

“Probably just couldn’t stand the stink,” Brook called back.

CHAPTER 28

It was the first chance Rozlyn had to see Mouse since that first morning. She’d arranged for clothes and the other items on the nurse’s ad hoc list to be taken in, but circumstances had militated against her own visit.

Mouse was pleased to see her. He looked better, not so pale, and the bruises were now mostly yellow edged, with the blackest reduced to a mere deep violet. Now the swelling had subsided, the ruined eye had a hollow look, the half-closed lid sunk back against the blood-red void. Rozlyn was surprised to find it exposed like this. The heavy bandages, she could cope with, but being faced with the emptiness where Mouse Man’s eye had once been was unsettling and nauseating.

Mouse saw her look. “The doc’s coming to examine it again,” he said, “so they took the dressing off.” He smiled. “You’re my second visitor today.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, that pretty blonde girl, Jenny, she called in to bring me another magazine. Found out I like mice, she did. Look.”

So, Rozlyn thought. There were magazines for mouse fanciers. “That’s good of her,” she said.

“Yes, she’s a lovely girl. She brought in all those things you got for me yesterday just at dinnertime and stayed for a chat. I let her eat my jelly. I’ve never been a big one for jelly, but she liked it. Raspberry, she said. She told me you were investigating, so you couldn’t come yourself.” He imbued the word with an almost religious awe.

Good on you, Jenny, Rozlyn thought. The thought drifted unbidden that Mouse did not think of her as pretty. She told herself not to be so stupid. “You look a lot better,” she said.

“Didn’t think I’d make it, did you?” Mouse said. “They told me you stopped half the night, then came back again early in the morning. I appreciate that.”

Rozlyn smiled tightly, uncomfortable with the role in which Mouse Man had cast her. “I fed the mice,” she said.

“Not many of them left, were there?”

“No. I’m sorry.”

“That’s all right. Jenny told me. She said they must have escaped into the street because I’d not shut the door properly. They’ll be all right.”

Silently, Rozlyn blessed Jenny again. It would never have occurred to her to lie, but she was glad Jenny had. Mouse shouldn’t know the cruelty that had been meted out to his little pets.

“She told me a few of them died,” Mouse went on. “He knocked the cages over, you see and some probably got trampled when we fought.” He shook his head. “He’s a cruel sort, whoever he was. He didn’t need to knock the cages down. The little folk couldn’t do anything to hurt him or to defend themselves. I’m glad most of them managed to run away.”

“I’m glad too,” Rozlyn said. “Mouse, can you remember any more about what happened?”

He shook his head. “I let myself in and I put the shopping down. Then I heard a noise. I heard them squeaking and someone moving about. Then he was all over me. Punching and kicking and shouting about Charlie stealing and hiding something.”

Mouse closed his eyes.

“He gave you no clue to what it was?”

“I’ve been thinking about it, Inspector Priest. Truly I have. I think . . . I’m almost sure, he was shouting something about a box. Charlie taking something from a box or a cabinet or something.” He shook his head again. “I’m sorry, it all happened so fast and he was kicking and hitting me all the time. I couldn’t think straight.”

The ward sister arrived then with a doctor in tow and Rozlyn, telling Mouse to rest and get well, thought it time to leave. She drove home, the problems surrounding Charlie’s death nagging her.

When she’d gone to visit Mouse Man she’d left her coat in the boot of the car and lifting it out now, she felt the weight of the spearhead still in the pocket.

“Damn.” She’d meant to return that to the evidence locker. She considered her options. Should she take it back tonight? Would anyone notice it was gone before morning? She decided not and that, even if they did, they’d find it had been signed out to her. It wasn’t as if it had walked. She went inside, pausing only to check for messages before going through to the kitchen.

She laid the spearhead on the kitchen table, glancing at it from time to time while she made tea and cobbled together a sandwich of cheese, smoked ham, salad and mayonnaise, thinking about that strange sensation she’d got, those weird impressions, when she’d taken the thing from Ethan’s hand.

Her head ached. She took a couple of paracetamol and went up to shower, leaving the spearhead in her bedroom. She didn’t want it out of her sight, not when she was the one who had not checked it