Honeybee Cozy Mysteries Box Set

by Katherine Hayton

  Chapter Thirteen

  Alice glanced over at the sergeant. “Chester was so agitated when I got home yesterday it took me ages to get him to settle. It wasn’t until early this morning it occurred to me to check the CCTV feed.”

  “I didn’t know you had cameras out at your place.”

  “I only got them installed after the theft of the hives. It was a suggestion from the insurance company when I lodged a claim and it’s one of the few ideas they had which made sense to me. It didn’t take long to get them installed and they record onto a hard drive in my spare room. Easy.”

  When she paused for a minute, Hogarth waved his hand. “Come on. Tell me what you saw.”

  “It showed Ant turning up in a car with another man. A gang member, judging from his patches. They got out of the car and headed off toward the Manuka fields, walking out of view.”

  Alice hugged her knees up to her chest for a second, thinking of the grainy video that had played out before her astonished eyes.

  “Chester was nosing around them while they stood in the drive and he took off after them when they moved on. I guess he saw whatever happened, the poor thing.”

  Again, Hogarth gesture for her to continue. “And?”

  “They were gone for most of an hour and when they walked back into the frame, they were both quite animated. It was obvious from the way they were huffing and puffing they’d run quite a distance.”

  She smiled. It wasn’t something Alice needed to tell the detective sergeant, but she was fairly sure Chester was the reason for their hasty exit. He was a good dog, and she’d told him so over and over this morning, leaving behind a load of treats in his bowl.

  “They were also arguing about something. At a guess, I think it’s to do with the precise description of what liquid gold actually meant.”

  Sally gave an abrupt laugh, so like a cough it seemed involuntary. Alice glanced over at her with a cocked eyebrow. “Nothing. Sorry, I was just thinking of the bewildered man turning up at what he must have thought was some kind of hidden lab in the woods and instead turned out to be beehives.”

  She appeared so delighted with the image that Alice snorted too. The things they’d had in their minds all day long were terrible. No wonder it kept coming out in random bursts of laughter or tears.

  “The argument didn’t last long before the gang member pulled out a gun and shot Ant in the chest. He spent a half hour or longer maneuvering the body into the trunk of his car, then he drove off.”

  No one felt like laughing any longer.

  “You have all of that on video?”

  Alice nodded, chewing on the edge of her lip to stop it wobbling. “I’ve got a copy on a thumb drive in my car, just in case something happened to the main hard drive while I was out.”

  Hogarth turned and stared hard at Doug. “Is the man on the recording from the same gang you visited with a bundle of cash.”

  Doug nodded, his face a study in misery. “Yeah. It’s the same.”

  “The money isn’t a payment for killing Ant, if that’s where your mind was going.” Sally’s voice was sharp and nasal, and her eyes fixed the sergeant with a piercing gaze.

  “I didn’t say it was.” Hogarth looked at his notes, reading back through a few pages before he gazed around the group again. “Ant’s body is in the trunk of the car that Jason is currently driving back from Nelson. Am I right?”

  Alice nodded. “He shouldn’t be too long, now.”

  Sally tucked her hands under her thighs, and looked over the sergeant’s shoulder, out the window. “Your detective constable appears to be at a loose end out there,” she said. “Do you want to bring him inside for this last bit?”

  Hogarth got to his feet, and rapped his knuckles on the ranch slider, gesturing to Willington who appeared relieved. He bounded toward the door, reminding Alice of Chester. She must remember to tell him once again tonight he was a very good dog.

  With a sigh, Sally stared down at the floor, her forehead contorted with a frown. “I guess this bit falls down to me,” she said, sounding extremely unhappy with the thought.

  “Jason was the one who contacted the gang when he thought his mate Ant had stumbled on a boatload of cheap drugs he was eager to sell.” Sally rocked slightly to press her weight on first one hand, then the other. Under the watchful gaze of the two detectives, she wanted a drink worse than she’d ever craved one in her life.

  “What’s that?” Willington asked, and Hogarth frowned, putting a finger up to his lips.

  “I’ll fill you in on everything later. Despite the time it’s taken to get the information out of this lot, it won’t take very long to have you up to speed.”

  “We don’t really know what the conversation looked like yesterday, but Jason arrived back home with a beaming smile on his face and a load of cash in his pocket. The minute he was through the door, he talked about touching base with Gloria and finally getting some time in with his son.”

  “To which you did what?”

  “Went out.” Sally tensed her hands as though they might escape and find a drink all by themselves, even with the weight of her thighs holding them down. “I couldn’t deal with it at all, so I made my excuses and headed off for a few hours. By the time I came back, Jason had disappeared.”

  “Where?”

  “Up to Nelson.” Sally stared down at the floor between her boots, remembering the shock as she answered the phone and heard a voice she thought forever lost to the past.

  Gloria’s nasal tone burrowed in through Sally’s head and combusted into an immediate headache. “What’s Jason doing getting in touch after all this time? Why is he still calling Steve his son?”

  Sally leaned her forehead against the wall and sighed. This was what she got for being such a coward. Not just today, but every day since Jason came back into her life. Why hadn’t she told him the truth on the first day, then it’d all be over with?

  Because if you killed his son, he’d take it out on you.

  Yes, brain. This time, I think you’re spot on.

  Steve might still be alive and well but to inform Jason he was no blood relative would sever their relationship forever. No matter how long it had been since the two interacted, a part of Jason’s mind still held onto the image of himself as a father and Steve as his son. To take that away was a type of murder.

  “Nobody bothered to tell him the truth,” Sally said, as though none of it had been her responsibility. “I thought they’d do it while we were both in prison, but it turns out, it slipped everyone’s mind.”

  Gloria giggled, then laughed, then roared.

  Her amusement became so loud Sally had to hold the receiver away from her ear. “You’re serious?” she said, checking as she spluttered to a halt. “He still thinks little Steve is his boy?”

  “When did he call you?” Sally moved to the sofa and sat down, wishing she could just press the off button and forget all about the phone.

  “About an hour ago. He’s driving up here to give me a lot of money, is what he said. Something about paying me for all the suffering you caused.”

  “Like he never caused you any harm.” Sally felt a rush of annoyance, then cut it off. The woman on the other end of the call had ended up in the hospital for three weeks, thanks to her. For a second, her fists throbbed with the memory. “Sorry.”

  The short apology seemed to take Gloria by surprise. “Yeah, well. Anyway, what am I meant to do when he gets up here? If you think I’m breaking the news to him, you’ve got another think coming.”

  “Just take the money and send him straight back home.” Sally rubbed at her temple, thump—thump—thump. “Don’t tell him anything.”

  “He’s not going to leave here without wanting to see his son.” Gloria gave another short giggle, then it cut off. Maybe she’d formed the same opinion as Sally. Jason wasn’t about to take the news kindly.

  “Give him a story that he’s away on a school camp or something. Are you still in touch with him?”
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br />   “Not likely. His mother severed all ties while I was in the hospital. I came home to a termination of services notice. Another thing to thank you for. That babysitting job was a sweet gig.”

  It was so hard to think over the pounding in her head. Sally clenched her teeth, but that just exacerbated the situation. “Facebook,” she said in a Eureka cry.

  “Eh?”

  “Try looking him up on Facebook or Instagram or whatever else is popular with the kids these days. He’ll have a dozen or more photos of himself on there. Or his mother will. Cut them out and put them in picture frames if you have them. Or just stick them onto your fridge with magnets.”

  Gloria’s voice filled with understanding. “I get you. Sure. I can do that.” She paused for a minute. “You think he’ll be happy leaving the money with me?”

  “I’ll pay him back for it. I should’ve offered you something a while ago, but I try not to think about that time. Still, I owe you. Take it and I’ll make it right with Jason—that bit’s not your concern.”

  “Okay.” This time Gloria’s voice sounded relieved and sure. “I can do that.”

  “Keep a phone with you in case it all goes pear-shaped.”

  “Already ahead of you there.” She laughed again. “My memory’s not that bad.”

  “How did Jason get hold of the car with Ant’s body in it?” The sergeant rubbed his eyes, glancing at the clock. The time moved forward with regularity again. “Why would the gang give it to him?”

  “I imagine they didn’t. It’s Ant’s car,” Sally explained. “Jason probably went around to see if he wanted to come along with him, and just borrowed the car when he saw it sitting out on the road. When I called up Gloria to ask what he was traveling in, she confirmed it was the same make and model as the vehicle on the CCTV feed.”

  A message beeped its arrival onto the sergeant’s phone and he read the text, looking back at the group with a smooth forehead. “Jason didn’t cause any problems up at Gloria’s end, then.”

  “No. She called me when he left and said it had all gone smoothly. He’s coming back down here thinking he’ll be able to visit again in a week’s time when Steve will’ve returned from the school camp.”

  “You should’ve called the police when you first saw the footage from the cameras,” Hogarth said, turning to Alice. “If we get around to the gang’s place and they’ve helped him to scarper, that’ll be on you.”

  “He’s there.” Doug stepped forward, placing his body between Alice and the sergeant. “You don’t need to worry on that score. They’re holding him and will continue to do so until you lot get around there with your arrest warrants.”

  “Is that what you were paying them for?”

  “He was paying them back for the money Jason was given for the drugs that weren’t,” Sally said. “Since Jason gave that money to Gloria, and I felt like I owed it to her after what I’d done, I paid the same amount out of my savings to make sure the gang was whole. The last thing any of us needed was them on our tail, feeling hard done by.”

  “The money Gloria received is in contravention of the proceeds of criminality act.” Hogarth’s voice sounded like he was lecturing a first-grader. “We’ll need to get it off her, and there’s no chance it will be returned.”

  “No, you won’t.” Alice folded her arms, poking her lips out in a stubborn line. “There’s no criminality. Sally earned that money from her work in the café, fair and square. It’s perfectly traceable. If you press us, we’ll just claim she asked the gang to pass the money to Jason for the trip up North to visit Gloria. Then, she got Doug here to go and pay them back.”

  “I—” Hogarth seemed set to protest, then gave it up with a shrug. “It doesn’t matter. What about…?” He trailed off, staring at the floor in confusion.

  “The only things outstanding are the dead body in the trunk of the car,” Alice said, “which is en route as we speak, and the loss of my beehives. Since the frames won’t be fit for anything, even if we did find out where Ant stored them, that’ll be dealt with by the insurance company.”

  “So, we—?” Again, the detective sergeant lost his words and stared around the group.

  “How about we go outside and wait for Jason to arrive?” Sally stood up and brushed down her clothes, flicking a piece of fluff back onto the sofa. “If you’d like to do something useful, I’m sure everyone here would appreciate if you could break the news to him.”

  “About the body in the trunk of the car he’s been driving around?” Hogarth’s jaw set in a firm line. “I’ll be more than happy to.”

  “No.” Sally laid a hand on the officer’s elbow, restraining him gently. “I meant about the fact he doesn’t—and has never had—a son.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  “And now what?” Sally put her hands on her hips and blew out a puff of air. “Do we do something to attract your bee friends to the party?”

  “They’ll come.”

  Alice stood back from the hives and looked at the setup with satisfaction. Because the bees didn’t like the harvest from the Manuka flowers nearly so well as they enjoyed the honeydew from the beech trees—or any other treat for that matter—they sat in the very center of the planted trees. If her workers wanted another food source, they could find it, but only at the cost of a very long flight.

  “I’m sure our customers will be happy to know that after a sparse season this year, next year should be a much bigger harvest.”

  “Oh, I don’t know.” Alice turned to wave at Doug who was hurrying forward with refreshments. “Part of me thinks they’re only willing to pay such a high price because of the exclusivity. If we got rid of some hives rather than expanding them, we might end up being able to double the asking price.”

  “Quick.” Sally aimed a fake karate kick toward a newly installed hive. With her white jumpsuit covering her from head to toe, she looked like a pale and bulky version of Kill Bill. “Get rid of them.”

  “If you really want to create a false supply issue and test the theory out, I could donate a few hives worth to the study next season.” One of the groups down in Otago University’s medical department was mounting an intense study into the effects of wounds treated with the Manuka honey. “That way, we have less but also get to tell them it was in a good cause.”

  “You know,” Sally broke off to accept a cup of coffee from the thermos Doug had brought along, “there just might be a fine marketing brain hidden somewhere under all your hair. That’s a genius idea. Can we fit all that onto a label?”

  “We can print out a nice story about it and tie it with a ribbon around the necks of the pottles.” Alice took a sip of her own coffee and tipped her head toward Doug in thanks. “It could make nice Christmas presents for those in the market for them.”

  Sally laughed and clapped her hands together, spilling a few drops onto dense grass underfoot. “Brilliant. I’ll work on it tonight and have some test dummies to try out in the café on Monday.”

  “Don’t you ever stop working?” Doug stared at her with a concerned expression on his face. “After everything you’ve been through lately, isn’t it about time to rest and recharge?”

  “This is me resting and recharging,” Sally protested. “I love doing little jobs like that. It’s the eight hours on my feet in the café that sometimes feel like work, and even that isn’t so bad.”

  “Have you heard from Jason?” Alice asked as a cloud briefly touched on her friend’s face. “Hogarth sent me a message to say he’d be released shortly.”

  In the end, it had been Detective Constable Willington that won the honor of informing Jason his son Steve had been a ruse to defraud him of money. While the group stood around, holding their breath as they awaited a reaction, he appeared to accept the news with some equanimity.

  “I always thought there was something wrong there,” Jason had said sadly after a few moments. “Right from the start, I thought it strange she didn’t come to me when she was pregnant. Still, I hoped…” />
  Jason had trailed off at that point, staring over his shoulder as the crime scene techs worked on the car behind him. His face filled with sorrow and his eyes glinted with tears.

  Then he turned around and punched Willington in the gut, and everything got back to normal.

  The assault carried its own penalty but was also an obvious violation of Jason’s parole. Hogarth waited until his poor DC recovered, then gave him the dubious honor of arresting his assailant.

  Jason traveled to the station in the back of a marked police car while the others crammed into the sergeant’s plain wrap vehicle to follow along behind, ready for a long afternoon and evening of completing statements.

  Part of Jason’s release would be the reintroduction of the restraining order to protect Sally, plus a new one issued for Gloria, Alice, and Doug.

  “This time, we’ll need to ensure that at the first sign of trouble, we report him,” Alice insisted as they walked back to the house. “No excuses or waiting to see what Jason wants, agreed?”

  Chester ran out to greet her as Alice mounted the steps of the porch and she took a second to pat him, calling out how he was ‘such a good dog.’

  As her friends shuffled past her into the lounge, Alice stopped and looked out across the fields surrounding her house. The past few months had been crammed full of activity after years of everything being stable. Excitement had its own entertainment value, but she now hoped that her life would go back to being boring and staid.

  “And if I never get within sniffing distance of a dead body,” she told Chester, the dog staring at her with admiration and hanging off every word, “it’ll be too soon.”

  Chester wagged his tail and gave a bark of affirmation, after which Alice gestured him inside. One last look to see everything outside was settled and peaceful just as it should be, then she closed the door behind her and went to join her friends.