by Ruby Loren
Whales and a Watery Grave
Madigan Amos Zoo Mysteries
Ruby Loren
Copyright © 2018 by Ruby Loren
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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Contents
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Books in the Series
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1. The Getaway
2. Bad Publicity
3. For the Love of Choc
4. Boyfriend or Burglar?
5. The Star of the Show
6. Made-up for Murder
7. Dead and Gone
8. A Bright Star
9. Plots and Presenters
10. Special Delivery
11. Life’s a Box of Chocolates
12. An Obsession with Fame
13. The Vanishing Act
14. Old Friends, New Enemies
15. The Smile of a Dolphin
16. Avery Zoo Mark II
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Books in the Series
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Also by Ruby Loren
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Please note, this book is written in British English and contains British spellings.
Books in the Series
Penguins and Mortal Peril
The Silence of the Snakes
Murder is a Monkey’s Game
Lions and the Living Dead
The Peacock’s Poison
A Memory for Murder
Whales and a Watery Grave
Chameleons and a Corpse
Foxes and Fatal Attraction
Monday’s Murderer
Prequel: Parrots and Payback
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1
The Getaway
I opened the paper at the centre spread and immediately regretted it. I’d been doing my best to avoid looking at news and gossip sites on the internet ever since my comic had shot up the book charts and stuck there, right at the top. The controversy when the press had discovered my publishing company had mysteriously disappeared off the face of the earth, leaving me without a contract, had only served to give me and Monday’s Menagerie even more publicity.
It wasn’t exactly ideal.
Luckily, I hadn’t been left in limbo for long. My inbox had been full to the brim with offers from publishing houses, and after much perusing, and an entire day of telephone conversations, I’d chosen a medium-sized publisher who had agreed to the exact same terms that my last publisher had offered. I’d definitely got the sense that my new publishers couldn’t believe their luck and had been willing to settle for pretty much anything I asked them for, but I also genuinely thought they’d do a good job. So far, they had! There’d been no production problems of hard copies and I was almost able to forget the farce my first contract had been.
That was… until I’d looked at the paper.
After the whole mess with the undercover operation had happened, and then the good part when Auryn had asked me to marry him, we’d made the joint decision that Lucky and I would move in with him. A couple of days had passed and everything was going great… until the paper had arrived.
For some unknown reason, Auryn still had a newspaper delivered to his house at the weekend. My fiancé had never struck me as a man who liked to read the paper, but perhaps I simply didn’t know everything about him yet. It was a nice thought that we still had things to learn about each other. I knew that some would see our engagement as hasty, but although we hadn’t been dating for long, I’d known Auryn for years and there was just something different about this relationship. He was the one.
Whilst Auryn slept in late on a rare Saturday away from the zoo for us both, I’d recklessly decided to flick through the paper. It turned out to be to my cost.
“How do they know all of these details?” I said, vaguely horrified as I looked at the unflattering photo of me from several years ago, presumably dredged up from Avery Zoo’s website. My hair had been having a particularly wild day and my askew glasses hinted at more frugal times. I recalled fixing them with sellotape which had meant one side had ended up higher than the other.
Unfortunately, the photo wasn’t the worst part.
The article had begun innocuously enough, recapping my ‘overnight’ fame (from years’ worth of comics) and of course, the scandalous mystery of my vanishing publisher. I’d begun to glaze over when the writer had taken a hard turn into way more personal territory.
“What,” I muttered and then repeated it several more times. Whoever was responsible for the article, they’d taken the time to contact all of the places I’d worked at during the past year as an animal consultant. I knew that I’d done a good job at every zoo, but the people who’d agreed to have their words printed in this article weren’t necessarily those I’d got on best with. Bringing change to a zoo always ruffled a few feathers and now it looked as though those angry birds with their ruffled feathers were going to turn around and bite me. I shut my eyes for a second. It was early and I was mixing metaphors - a sure sign that I was on the verge of being very peeved indeed.
I sighed and let it go. I’d known reading about myself was a bad idea. Whether it be compliments or insults, I knew that neither should sway my opinion of myself and what I loved to do. All the same, my eyes were caught by something further down in the text.
“Rumour has it that Monday’s Menagerie is being optioned for film in Hollywood right now,” I read aloud and then said ‘what?’ a few more times to fully express my disbelief. No one had said anything about a film. Surely this was just more nonsense tabloid gossip? Sure, my comic had been a surprise success, but I couldn’t even see how it would work as a film! They were mostly random animal observations that made a joke in three to four panels. It was hardly deep.
“I’m sure it’s nothing,” I reassured myself.
“Do you talk to yourself often?” Auryn asked, walking into the kitchen.
“I was talking to Lucky!” I protested only to find my treacherous cat was nowhere to be seen.
“He’s out murdering the local fauna. I’m pretty sure I saw him out of the bedroom window. He was hauling a rat onto a pile of other tiny corpses…”
I pulled a face.
“What’s our stance on that? As zoo owners, we’re supposed to be working to preserve animals, and yet we let this massacre go unchallenged,” he mused.
I shot him a scathing look. “We are not going to get philosophical on a Saturday morning.”
Auryn grinned and sat down at the table, glancing at the paper as he did so. “Wow. That is quite a picture!” He snagged the paper from me. “I think I’ll frame this and put it on the wall in the hall. It’ll be the first thing any guests see when they come into the house. My famous fiancée.”
“I hate you,” I told him, trying to seize the paper back.
“Hey, whoa… you’re getting a film made?” His dark blonde eyebrows shot up. “How’s that going to work?”
“I know, right?! It’s the first I’ve heard of it anyway. I’m sure it’s all talk.”
We sat in silence for a moment both looking outside at the bright end of March weather. I reflected that, although there’d been some recent blips in the weather, including a very unexpected coating of snow for the South East, spring was finally here to stay. Everything was growing, and the animals at the zoo were celebrat
ing the warmer weather in their own ways. It was the perfect time to open a brand new zoo…
“I think we should take a break. We should go away somewhere nice, just the two of us. I think we’ve both done enough these past months to deserve some time away,” Auryn suddenly announced.
I gaped at him for a moment.
“You think it’s a bad idea?”
“No, it’s not that. It actually sounds nice,” I confessed, thinking of all the bother my comics had caused and the stress of finally discovering the truth about what had been going on ever since I’d met Lowell. “But what about Avery Zoo? And we’re supposed to be planning the opening of the yet-to-be-named other zoo, too.” I hated to be the party pooper, but we were tied to our work.
“I know you’ve never wanted to be stuck in one place when you could go anywhere saving animals. I understand that and I wanted to show you that it is possible to go away.”
“But how?”
“This isn’t just a spur of the moment thing. I’ve arranged for everyone at Avery to pitch in with the running of the zoo. Claudia has been especially helpful.”
“I’m sure she has,” I jumped in, and we exchanged a knowing smile. Claudia’s interest in Auryn had never been genuine and we both knew that there was no need to worry any longer.
“Anyway, Avery is under control. The yet-to-be-named zoo has been doing just fine with the skeleton staff caring for the animals. You’ve already sent a few of our best over there to oversee things and you’ve been working so hard on it all.”
“Patching up a zoo that was put together in five minutes flat,” I said with a sigh.
The once named Mellon Zoo had been close to perfect when I’d approved it, but I hadn’t been at all surprised when the cracks had very literally started to show in the weeks that had followed our taking over of the place. Wood had warped in the wet weather and the living roofs and walls had definitely seen some significant slippage, due to their lack of deep roots. I knew that, in time, that was one problem that would be remedied, but for now, it felt like an awful lot of patching up needed to be done before the new zoo’s postponed opening at the end of April.
“But you’ve got that under control! Contractors are in and - surprise! I asked Tiff if she could oversee it all. She said yes, so long as you two can still text, or Skype. She also offered to look after Lucky, although…” Auryn glanced out of the window. “I’m pretty sure he can take care of himself.”
“You think it’s a good idea?” I queried, still having doubts.
“Yes, I do! Anyway, it’s not entirely without ulterior motive…”
“Oh?” I raised my eyebrows at him and he pulled a face at me.
“Don’t be mad… it’s not that kind of ulterior motive. Although, I could backtrack…” He grinned. “You know I’ve been working on this whole ‘review the zoo’ thing with both customers and staff giving feedback? I think there’s one area we could potentially improve upon.” He drummed his fingers on the table for a moment. “I’m not saying that it’s a change we’ll be making anytime soon, but I figured a little reconnaissance mission wouldn’t hurt.”
“Tell me,” I said, knowing he was enjoying stretching this out. It was working though. I’d realised I really did want to have a holiday - even if it had ulterior motives.
“A couple of years ago, I met this guy on one of those management training courses my dad sent me on. We kept in touch. He’s now head keeper at a marine life park. Other than the penguins, and a few fish tanks, we don’t have a lot in the way of marine animals.”
“Well, we aren’t near the sea,” I pointed out.
Auryn nodded. “True, but I still think it would be nice to have some more variety. I’m not saying we should open a dolphin tank…”
“Good,” I cut in, having my own views on the wisdom of keeping certain aquatic mammals in captivity.
“But what about seals, or something?” Auryn shook his head. “I mean, that’s just it! I don’t know where the best place to start is. That’s why I contacted Nile and asked him a few questions. Then he suggested we should come for a visit.”
“Where’s the marine park?”
Auryn grinned. “Mallorca!”
“Okay, I’m in,” I said, having suspected he was talking about somewhere like Torquay. After what had happened last time I’d been in the South, I wasn’t sure I wanted to return so soon.
“Good, because I’ve already booked the flights and the villa. We leave tomorrow.” He glanced down at the paper again. “I know I’m the one trying to persuade you to take a break, but do you think it will be okay, you leaving the country? I mean… if you’re needed in Hollywood…”
I did my best hair toss I could muster with the cloud that puffed around my head this morning.
Auryn smirked. “A face made for radio.”
“Hey!” I protested, picking up the newspaper and swatting him with it. “You’re marrying this face!”
“It was a joke, I swear.” He was still smiling. “I’m sure you’d be great on TV.”
I shook my head. “Nope. I do interviews, I smile for pictures, but that is it. I am never going to get involved in any kind of filming or ridiculous acting.”
I had no idea just how wrong I would turn out to be.
2
Bad Publicity
Even though it was only the first day of April, the sun was shining when we touched down in Mallorca.
“This is already great. I haven’t been away since…” Auryn started talking and then cleared his throat. “…Well, it feels like forever, anyway.”
I smiled silently. Before Auryn had found himself saddled with both owning and being in charge of the entire zoo, he’d done a fair bit of travelling. His blonde slightly surf-style hair and tanned skin had long been the envy of the zoo. It was only recently that I’d come to realise it was mostly down to his frequent trips to sunny places. Having lived in the family house all his life, Auryn’s work at the zoo, even as an apprentice keeper, had meant he’d ended up with a decent amount of disposable income. I also suspected he may have been given some sort of allowance, even while his father struggled with the financial viability of the zoo and made some very questionable choices - but that was all in the past now. Auryn was fully invested in the zoo’s future, and everyone was allowed to have a teenage period. I knew people who were thirty and still lived in that phase. After all the hard work he’d put in, a holiday was definitely well deserved. And, as Auryn had gleefully reminded me on the plane ride over, there was going to be no time at all for such things once the new zoo was officially open, and it was all hands on deck to bring in the punters and make the twin zoos a roaring success. He’d actually used the phrase ‘roaring success’ which had made it that much worse.
“We should really come up with a name for the new zoo,” I said for what felt like the hundredth time when we walked down the steps from the plane and trotted across the tarmac towards the stuffy bus that took you to the terminal building.
“You didn’t like my suggestion.”
“We are not naming it after the comic! I’ve already explained that this is probably my five minutes of fame. People will get over it and then I’ll fade into obscurity the way most fads do. Something that’s a huge hit one year can be completely forgotten the next.” I shook my head, already feeling my waves jump into frizzy curls from the surprisingly high humidity level. “Anyway, people might think it’s a theme park rather than a zoo.”
“How about using your last name? Avery Zoo and Amos Zoo sound good together. Just like us.” Auryn winked and I mimed sticking my fingers down my throat as we walked through towards passport control.
“My name will be changing soon. Although, probably not my author name,” I allowed, knowing it was too late for that. “Anyway… I’m sure there’s a better name out there! I don’t know why this matters so much, but it does. Perhaps it’s because of the thoughtless way it was named before…” I said and then bit my tongue. What I’d just said wa
s verging on me breaking the Official Secrets Act I’d signed, forbidding me from speaking about anything and everything that MI5 had been working on during their time at Mellon Zoo. I was still not over being manipulated the way I had been, but I hoped all of that was in the past now. Somehow, naming the zoo was an important step in putting all of that behind me. I didn’t want to mess it up.
Auryn raised an eyebrow. “Secret stuff, huh?” He wasn’t seriously asking. Before I’d known the entire truth and had been nailed to the wall and forced to sign that document, I’d told Auryn all that I suspected, and even though it must have sounded pretty nuts, I’d only been sketchy on a few of the details. Unlike my previous boyfriend, who’d got me into the whole mess in the first place and then persistently manoeuvred me without owning up to the truth, I’d wanted to share everything with Auryn. ‘Lies destroy lives’ was my new motto.
“It really is good to get away, isn’t it? I could be wrong, but there was something about that newspaper article we read the other day that made me think the press might be turning on me,” I mused, picking up a bag from the luggage conveyor belt.
Auryn shrugged. “Don’t let any of it get to you. You know who you are and what the press are like. They’ll twist anything to make a person look bad in order to sell their papers.”
“Hmmm,” was all I could say to that. It might be the case for most plucked-from-nowhere celebrities, but I really did have a history that could be turned against me. I’d never committed a crime, but I’d definitely been in close proximity to some heinous ones fairly recently. “Good thing we’re settling down and running our zoos,” I said to Auryn, having mentally jumped on a few spaces.