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) 📖

CHAPTER 35

Rozlyn drove out to Mark Richards’ place and climbed the wall. She knew it was stupid, she wasn’t even sure what she was looking for, but despite the way her body ached and her head thumped she couldn’t even think of going back to bed. The answer lay in that house or in the chantry.

Answer to what? The reason Charlie had been murdered? She couldn’t quite get to grips with the logic of it or see the full picture, but the answer had to be yes.

She ran through everything in her mind. Charlie had worked for Mark Richards — Richards’ alias was Thomas Thompson. Donovan knew both Charlie and Richards. Question, how did he get to know Charlie? Ah, that was right — Mouse said he’d met him at one of the houses, that he organised work for those people Richards brought into the country. Or was that speculation? He knew that Charlie took any items found at the houses to Donovan’s office — with the exception, presumably, of the little radio he had given to Mouse. Did Mark Richards know of this arrangement? And what did Donovan want, anyway, with those sad little items the migrant workers had left behind?

Yet whether or not Mark Richards and Donovan had continued with what had been a superficially friendly relationship was irrelevant, really. The important thing was that she now knew Charlie had been at Richards’ place.

So, why had he gone there? Did Mark Richards have something Donovan wanted? Was Charlie going to warn Richards of that? Was Charlie threatening to tell what he knew about Richards’ alias, as Thomas Thompson, a man who brought illegal immigrants into the country?

Had Charlie stolen something from Mark Richards’ place? Rozlyn’s best guess was that Donovan had stolen from Richards and had used Charlie to carry out the theft. Charlie had then kept something for himself, something he hoped to sell to help Clara Buranou, and Donovan had killed him because of it — except, of course, Rozlyn couldn’t even prove there’d been a robbery and Charlie couldn’t have returned whatever it was before he died because otherwise Donovan would not still be looking for it and his attack on Mouse clearly showed that he was.

So, had Charlie simply refused to tell where he’d hidden the object and Donovan murdered him because of that? Seeing what he’d done to Mouse Man, Rozlyn would have expected Donovan Baker to try and beat the information out of Charlie rather than killing him immediately, but there’d been no other significant marks on Charlie’s body. The thrust of the spear spoke of a single impulsive act, not a systematic attempt to extract information, so, not Donovan Baker, then? Mark Richards, perhaps?

Had he caught Charlie returning to collect whatever it was he had stolen? Rozlyn was more than half convinced Charlie would have concealed the object in the grounds, rather than risk Donovan searching him later and discovering it — and Rozlyn did not for one minute believe that Donovan would put trust in his associates. So, it would have to be something small, something Charlie could slip into a pocket and hide easily and, also, something Charlie would have immediately recognised as valuable.

Something like that missing brooch — which might not be missing at all, but simply, as Alfred had told her, sent for restoration or whatever he’d said. Had she any sense, she’d talk it over with Brook in the morning and, should Brook agree with her, demand that Mark Richards produce the missing brooch or give the address of the conservator and, Rozlyn supposed, that would knock her theory of the robbery fair and square on the head especially if Mark Richards then produced his inventory. An inventory which would not, anyway, include the supposed stolen objects because he’d not declared them in the first place. Rozlyn’s head swirled. Her fever had returned, accompanied by the thumping head and dryness in her throat that no amount of fluids or soothing pastilles could shift.

Simplify your story, she told herself sternly. Charlie had been in the chantry. Had he also been in Mark Richards’ house? Had he gone there to tell Richards he knew exactly what he was up to and maybe try and blackmail him? Maybe while there he had stolen something on impulse. The cabinets in the room that housed the collection were not locked. Maybe Charlie took something valuable and Donovan got wind of it after Charlie was dead, assumed Mouse must know where it was.

She tried again to order her thoughts. She had been thinking in terms of the insurance scam that her colleague at Art and Antiques had told her about, but if the chantry treasure — the probably mythical chantry treasure — had been found, then Mark Richards hadn’t declared it so it wouldn’t be insured, so there’d be no money to be made from such an enterprise even had he declared the robbery. Had he intended to sell it and promised Donovan a cut from the profits? And, if so, why wait three years? Had he reneged on that agreement?

Rozlyn sat, perched at the top of the wall surrounding the estate and told herself that this was stupid. Not only did she not know what she was looking for; she didn’t even know if there was anything to look for.

Then, she decided that she’d never know unless she tried to find out and, feverish fuzzy logic taking precedence, she swung her second leg over the wall and dropped down on the other side.

She kept a small Maglite in the car and she used that now. She kept it low to the ground to minimise the chance of anyone seeing from the house. In her fever-fuddled brain, Albert had assumed almost superhuman faculties for observation and Rozlyn thought of him as a latter-day Argos, one eye always open while the others slept.

The distance to the chantry