“Bridget!” Sean dodged through the mass of GBs who were swarming all over the tunnelling room as if he were a linebacker, or quarterback, or some sort of American football player who ran and dodged people.
“What’s going on?” I asked as Sean grabbed my wrist and pulled me through the GB swarm. I didn’t think I’d ever seen a tunnelling room so busy. It was like an airport when all the planes were delayed.
“It’s about the missing files,” Sean hissed. “I reported it. I had to. It’s procedure.”
I placed a hand on his shoulder and dipped my face so I could look into his eyes. “You did the right thing, Sean. It’s not your fault they are missing.”
“I didn’t know this would happen. I thought we’d be audited.” Sean’s head was on a swivel as he spoke. It was almost like a scene from The Exorcist the way it kept turning.
I caught his head in my hands to keep it still. “Sean, don’t worry, okay? You didn’t steal the files. You didn’t misplace the files. You explained the rules clearly to me. I can confidently attest that to anyone who asks. You are great at your job. Everything will be okay. Okay?”
Sean exhaled a long breath. “Okay.”
Officer Fredrickson came to stand beside us. “Mr Andrews?”
Sean cowered back. “Yes?”
Fredrickson placed his hand on Sean’s shoulder and tunnelled him before I could do anything about it. Sean screamed my name as he disappeared. The panic in his voice made my stomach drop.
“It’s unfortunate the company you’ve been keeping of late, Ms Sway,” Officer Leonard said from behind me.
“Sean didn’t do anything!” I exclaimed. I absolutely did not screech it. And definitely not in his face.
Officer Leonard inclined his head. “Perhaps not. Perhaps your friend who works on reception hasn’t done anything either.”
“Alexander? He’s no more involved in this than Sean is,” I said, trying to rein my screech in.
Officer Leonard nodded. “Maybe your friend, the coordinator hasn’t done anything either.”
“Sabrina? What is wrong with you? These people haven’t done anything.”
“Haven’t they?” Officer Leonard frowned at me. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.” I bit the word off.
“It looks to me as if your friend on reception concocted some murderous scheme and both the induction officer and the coordinator helped him by hiding or doctoring files.”
“That’s ridiculous. And completely untrue. And you know it.”
“Well, regardless of what you believe I know, all three will be prosecuted by the end of the day unless an alternative culprit is identified.” Officer Leonard winked at me. “Looks like you’re on your own, Ms Sway.”
Chapter Sixteen
“Parole Officer Salier is busy.” The constable didn’t look up from what I was sure was a very dull procedural manual.
“How do you know he’s busy?” I asked. “You haven’t checked anything.”
“He’s in an interrogation.” The constable remained focused on the manual.
“Well, pull him out of the interrogation.”
“Can’t. Come back later.”
“Later when?”
The constable flipped a page but still didn’t look at me. “Later.”
“I want to speak to your supervisor.” I reached over the counter and closed the manual. “Now.”
The constable’s head jerked up. He looked me over and then leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. “Can’t.”
“Is he in an interrogation too?”
“Bingo.”
“Bridget?” Greg, an induction supervisor, walked into the police reception area. “What are you doing here? You should be at work.”
“I needed to speak to my parole officer.” I wasn’t all that familiar with Greg. I’d only met him twice, but I was happy to take help where I could find it.
The constable pointed to me but spoke to Greg. “Get her out of here or I’m going to charge her with wasting police time.”
I rounded on the constable. “I’m sorry. Who is wasting whose time?”
“You’re wasting my time.” The constable looked to Greg again. “Last chance.”
“Come on, Bridget. We can check back in later.” Greg put an arm around my shoulders and shuffled me toward the tunnelling room.
“But I need to speak to my parole officer.” I shook off Greg’s hold and I walked over to the counter. I jabbed the top with my finger. “Now!”
The constable stood and grabbed a notebook and a pen “That’s it. I’m charging you.”
Greg rushed over to me. “No, there’s no need. We’re leaving.”
“Do not try and drag me out again,” I warned Greg.
“Getting yourself arrested isn’t going to help anyone here,” Greg whispered. “And we’re short-staffed at Arrivals. Sean said he thought you were going to be an amazing inductioneer because you cared about people. Show me that he was right about you.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “That was a low blow.”
“Whatever works,” Greg said with a shrug.
I pointed at the constable. “I’ll be back.”
“Look forward to it,” he said and gave me a mock salute.
I made a disgusted noise and followed Greg out of the reception area and into the tunnelling room. We landed at Arrivals and he ushered me through the GB mayhem.
“You’ll need to take the group that Sean was assigned,” Greg said, directing us toward the room Sean and I had previously occupied with Jeremy’s group.
“On my own?”
He nodded. “Yep.”
I stalled at the door. “I’m not sure that I can.”
“You’ll have to.” Greg scanned his magnetic card over the door lock. “With Sean gone and Christina being questioned about losing her keys—”
“Someone lost their keys?” I asked.
“Yesterday. At least that’s the last time she remembers having them,” Greg said and tugged on his own set of keys around his neck. “It’s policy to keep them either around your neck or attached to your trousers but, evidently, that isn’t a secure enough practice and now with the GBs dragging anyone and everyone in for questioning, we’re short-staffed. Please remember, how you behave is a direct reflection on Sean’s teaching skills. In you go.” Greg opened the door, placed a magnetic door lock card in my hand and all but shoved me inside.
I glanced around the group of newly transitioned I was supposed to induct. On my own. While worrying about everyone. But I could do this. I’d been through it recently myself. I pushed my shoulders back and strode to the front of the room with a confidence I didn’t feel.
“Hi, everyone. My name’s Bridget and I’ll be your induction officer today. Let’s start by filling in some forms. Yay. Forms.” It wasn’t anything near as peppy as Sean but I was trying. Which was the important thing, right? And I’d said “yay” so that had to count for something.
“Hey. I know you,” a voice said as I started to make my way around the room, handing out the stack of forms and pens. The speaker helpfully waved at me. “Over here.”
He looked familiar but it took me a second to recognise him. “It’s George, right? Madame Zorina’s husband?”
“Do you call her that all the time?” He laughed. Well, didn’t he seem in better spirits.
“Yes. Do you remember what happened to you?” I asked as I sped up my form distributing to get to his desk. And yes, I knew if he’d been murdered the chances were he wouldn’t remember and, if he did, he would lose his mind. But I had to ask.
“How I died, you mean? I was … I …” He shook his head and suddenly his eyes became unfocused as he stared at the far wall. Okay, that was not happening. He was not losing his mind on my watch, even if it was slightly my fault.
“Hey!” I tapped the back of his hand sharply three times. It brought some life back to his face. “Do you know why mediums are getting murdered?”
“Not real
ly,” he said, his eyes focusing on me again.
“Okay. ‘Not really’ implies that you know something, so how about you tell me what that something is?”
“What are you going to do for me in return?” he asked, leaning back in his chair and folding his arms.
“Do you remember the guy who drove the bus?” I asked and his face twitched. Yeah, he remembered Charon. “Well, if you don’t tell me what you know I’m going to call him back so he can make you tell me what you know. Choice is yours.”
He hesitated then sighed. “Fine. What do you want to know?”
“Do you know why Jeremy was at the department store the day he was murdered?” I asked and he hesitated again. I stepped toward the door. “I’ll get Charon, I swear.”
“Jeremy had a contact. I don’t know who but I think he was meeting them at the store. Eric and Mal knew that Jeremy was gaming the system and they wanted to find out how. I guess they figured they might be able to flip Jeremy’s source or find out how he was doing it so they could do something similar. They followed him to the store. I overheard them talking about it and wanted in on it so I followed them. I—”
I held up my hand for him to stop. I wasn’t Sabrina. I couldn’t hold my questions until the end. “How did they know he was meeting his source at the store? How did they know he was gaming the system? How did you know about this? And how do you know they knew? How—just—in general?”
George shrugged. “I don’t think they did know what was happening at the store but he had a big show the night after, so I think they probably assumed he was meeting someone there. It was late and the store was closed. He wasn’t going shopping, was he?”
“But how did they know he was there?” This wasn’t adding all the way up.
“They’d had someone following him about for about two months so they knew this was out of the ordinary for him. I reckon the guy they had following called them to let them know something was up and they hustled to get there and spied on him.”
Who knew the psychic game could be so sneaky? “And how do you know all this?”
“This, like everything in life, is about information. The person who has the most information is the winner.” He delivered the line with the practised charm of a con man. In those two sentences I could see what Madame Zorina had originally seen in him and why she’d left him. At least, I assumed she’d left him.
I nodded. “That’s nice. How about you answer my question?”
“I did. I guess it wasn’t the answer you wanted,” he said with a grin.
“It wasn’t an answer, it was a response. Answer the actual question.” I had a brief flashback to a conversation I’d had with Oz that had gone remarkably similar. Only I’d been answering like George. I wondered if I’d come off as much a douche as he had. I shook my head to myself. That was unlikely. But I was beginning to see why Oz was always so frustrated with me.
“I bribed one of Mal’s assistants. They didn’t know what exactly was going on. They remembered he’d met with this guy. So I looked the guy up, found out he was a private investigator and told him I’d pay him to share the info with me. He’d already done the work so it was money for nothing. He told me they were going to the department store. So I followed them.”
“And what did you see when you got there?”
He shook his head. “I got there late and I came in the back way so I didn’t see whoever Jeremy was meeting. I heard footsteps coming down the stairs so I hid. Mal and Eric scurried past me in a panic. Talking about how they’d seen the Grim Reaper or something stupid. That was the last time I saw them.”
Before I could press him for more details the magnetic door lock flicked open and a GB walked in. The one who’d stolen Sean earlier. Fredrickson. Didn’t he get about?
“Ah, Wallace. Finally.” George slapped a hand on the stack on forms in front of him. “You had me worried for a moment.”
I narrowed my eyes at the GB. So Wallace was a general code name for all GBs when speaking to livies? Well, wasn’t Sabrina going to be super smug when she found that out. Well, she would be if I could get her out of being sentenced to an infinity in prison.
“What are you doing?” Fredrickson asked me as I straightened up.
“Inducting the newly transitioned.” I gestured around the room. “Obviously. What are you doing?”
“Stop talking to him.” Fredrickson commanded me and clicked his fingers at George. “Let’s go.”
“Whoa, whoa. I can’t let you take him,” I said. And it wasn’t because I hadn’t finished pumping him for information. But when Officer Leonard had taken Jeremy he’d given Sean forms to process the transfer. I had no idea what forms were needed but I definitely needed something.
“I can and I am.” Fredrickson motioned for George to follow.
“Show me the paperwork or he’s not going anywhere.” I put my hand on George’s shoulder and pushed him back down in his seat, probably harder than necessary since he grunted when he hit the chair.
Fredrickson narrowed his eyes at me. I very much had the impression he was trying to stare me down. Boy, was he messing with the wrong girl today. Or, really, any day. I folded my arms and stared right back.
“You know you could rock, paper and scissors for me,” George said, looking between us. “I’m not particularly partial to redheads but I’d make an exception in your case.”
Slowly, I turned my glare on George. He grinned at me, then nodded in the direction of Fredrickson. The GB was holding out several sheets of folded paper.
“It’s all in order. I need you to sign the last page.”
I took the papers and flipped through them. I was fairly sure it was the same document that Officer Leonard had given Sean when he’d taken Jeremy. “Why didn’t you give these to me straightaway?”
“Didn’t feel like it. Sign the last page so I can go,” Fredrickson said.
“Okay.” I sat down and started reading the forms he’d handed me.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m reading it before I sign it.”
“Why?”
I shrugged. “I don’t trust you.”
“I need to get him back,” the GB said.
I nodded. “Yeah, well, that sounds like a whole lot of your problem.”
∞
“You’re a little late, Bridget. Is everything okay?” Eleanor called from the doorway of the fort as I came barrelling toward her. She glanced around. “Where’s Sabrina?”
The induction group had been quiet after George had left and it had given me nothing but hours to think. I’d come up with several plans but most of them had devolved into scenarios that involved wearing a patent leather catsuit, diamonds and James Bond villain type deaths for everyone. So by the time I’d finished with my group I was feeling somewhat emotionally agitated.
I’d gone back to the police station to talk to Oz, but the constable still wouldn’t let me speak to him. Once again he’d threatened to arrest me and in that moment I realised there were three people I knew I would always be able to count on in my afterlife. Oz was in an interrogation. Sabrina was being interrogated. That left the third. And I was betting she’d be able to pull off a catsuit with me if it came to it.
“Eleanor, I need your help.”
“Anything, Bridget.”
“Officer Leonard has arrested everyone. He’s going to blame them for murders they didn’t commit. I need to find some evidence to point toward the real killer. I can’t do that, though, because I promised my parole officer I wouldn’t get involved in this stuff and the stupid constable won’t let me speak to him.”
Eleanor stepped out of the doorway and led me a small distance across the grass. “Did you say the GBs have arrested everyone? Who have they arrested?”
“All of my friends. Sabrina, Sean and Alexander for sure. Other people, too, maybe. I don’t know.”
“If they’re innocent they’ll be fine. Not even the GBs can prosecute people without evidence.”
“If the GBs think they’re guilty then they must have a reason for it, although that does seem extraordinarily fast,” Eleanor admitted. “But they can’t prosecute people without evidence.”
“They have no evidence, Eleanor. I promise they don’t. Officer Leonard is trying to drag me into this for some reason.”
“What if we call your parole officer? Surely, he’ll be able to get to the bottom of this.” Eleanor glanced over her shoulder at the doors to the fort and nudged me a little further away. I assumed so that the other group members wouldn’t hear the drama. “Did you say someone wouldn’t let you talk to him?”
“The GBs have taken one of my housemates into custody and the constable wouldn’t get him.”
“The constable denied you access to your parole officer?” Eleanor asked, a frown marring her features.
“Yes. Twice.”
“Is there any way you could’ve misunderstood?”
I shook my head so hard my ponytail touched each shoulder. “Not even slightly. And then he threatened to arrest me. Also twice.”
Eleanor hesitated. “Bridget, if the GBs think—”
“Eleanor. They didn’t do it. I know they didn’t. And they’re my friends. You know how hard I’ve found this and that it’s not easy for me to make these connections. But now, by being my friends, I feel like I’ve dragged them into this and I have to help them. I don’t want to break my promise to Oz but I can’t not help them.”
“Okay, don’t get upset.” Eleanor pulled me in for a quick hug and wiped a tear from my cheek that I didn’t even know had fallen. “We’ll sort this out, you and me. Okay?”
I nodded and wiped my face. This crying thing business was getting annoying. I’d have put it down to my period but since I didn’t have them anymore I was quite clearly becoming an emotional wreck. At least I’d foregone the eyeliner.
Eleanor strode across the grass and poked her head into the hall. “I’ll be back in two ticks. Please form a circle and begin talking about your most useful ghosting tip. Debbie, will you start, please?”
Dead and Buried: A Bridget Sway Novel (A Paranormal Ghost Cozy Mystery Series Book 4) Page 19