Deader Still

by Jordaina Sydney Robinson

  I wagged my finger at the trees. “But it would serve you all right for not listening to me.” Wouldn’t that just be perfect? There’d be no way Johnson would buy my innocence then.

  Warren emerged from the trees a little way to my left. “Who are you talking to?”

  “Myself. Since I’m the only sane person around here.”

  “That’s not saying much since you’re the only person around here.” Warren gestured around the clearing. “Where is everyone?”

  “Off looking for you.” I patted the ground next to me for him to come and sit. I didn’t like that he was standing and I was too tired to join him. If he was the murderer, I figured I’d have a better chance if he was sitting next to me. Or I might just let him kill me. I was getting a bit fed up of this afterlife business. “Where did you go?”

  “I needed to pee.”

  I screwed my face up. “So you did it in the trees?”

  “When you gotta go …”

  “Not to get too personal but any reason that took you ten minutes?”

  He shrugged. “I was exploring.”

  “Uh-huh, so you didn’t kill anyone while you were out there?”

  “No. Did you kill anyone while I was gone?”

  I shook my head and thought about Jessica. “It was a close thing though.”

  “Yeah, these people are idiots.”

  I arched an eyebrow at him. “Coming from you?”

  He grinned and rubbed the cheek I’d slapped. “How did you know?”

  “Seriously?”

  He nodded. “Right. You’re the queen of dead bodies. Of course you’d know the difference.”

  “Where did you learn it?” I asked. I still genuinely couldn’t see him as a murderer. Idiot? Obviously. But not someone who would bash another person’s head in with a log.

  “By accident,” he said, surveying the trees.

  I waited but that was all he said. “Can you do faces yet?”

  His attention jerked back to me. “What do you mean ‘faces’?”

  “I mean when you make yourself look like someone else.”

  He shook his head. “You can’t do that.”

  I stared at him for a moment. I could feel my inner Petal rambling on about what his proposed ignorance of face morphing could mean. I shut her down – she wasn’t helping my headache.

  I nodded, watching his expression closely. “Sure you can.”

  “Show me then.”

  “I can’t do it.”

  He snorted. “Convenient.”

  “If you can make it look like you have a head wound, why wouldn’t you be able to copy someone else’s face?” I asked.

  He frowned at me. “That’s a good point, Red. I’ll have to practise.” He looked around the clearing again. “Who are we betting on biting it?”

  “I was betting on you.”

  “I thought you thought I was the murderer?”

  I shrugged. “Murderer, murder victim. Who’s your money on?”

  He grinned. “If you weren’t sitting here with me, it’d be on you. For both as well. I figured if you weren’t the one swinging the grim reaper’s sickle, you’d be falling to its blade soon enough.”

  “Well, isn’t that a cheerful imag—” A high-pitched scream ricocheted off the trees around us and I sighed. “Why do they always have to scream like that? Makes me ashamed to be a woman, y’know?”

  Warren winced and put his finger in his ear and waggled it. “You want to try being right next to them when they do it.”

  “That was your fault for playing dead.”

  “And didn’t you punish me for it?”

  “No.” I inclined my head to him. “That was for attributing your faux murder to me.”

  “Yeah, but you didn’t need to slap me that hard.” He rubbed his cheek while nodding in the general direction of the scream. “You think we should go and see who’s kicked it?”

  “I’d really prefer to wait here to be accused than search it out.”

  Warren pushed himself up. “That’s your problem. You have no sense of curiosity.”

  “I’ve got plenty of problems.” I climbed to my feet and dusted off the seat of my jumpsuit. “But I don’t consider that one.”

  I followed Warren into the woods, feeling oddly safe now someone else was dead. What did that say about the state of my afterlife? Or my mental health? We followed the sound of screeching and chatter to find the group in the same horseshoe shape they had formed around Warren. Except this time Jessica didn’t part them and come at me with her accusing finger. No one did. In fact, when they heard us coming they parted on their own.

  I took a quick glance at the body and sighed. It was our one good suspect. It didn’t surprise me. I didn’t look at anyone. I just walked a short distance away, sat with my back to a tree and waited for the onslaught.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Ms Sway.” Officer Leonard crouched down in front of me. I was still sitting with my back against the same tree. “How’re you today?”

  “I’m very well thank you, Officer Leonard.” I didn’t see the point in being honest at this juncture and it would’ve been terribly impolite. “And yourself?”

  “Well, I could do without all these people being murdered.” He smiled his amiable smile at me. “But I assume you feel the same.”

  I waved my hand in dismissal of his concern. “No, I love it. Adds a little action to my otherwise dull day.”

  “I wouldn’t want you to have a dull day.” He checked over his shoulder at the crowd of people around the body who were crying and pointing in my direction. “And how are these assessments going for you?”

  “Oh, I’m just sailing through them. Top of my class, I think.”

  “I’m glad to hear it. I’d miss you if you had to be re-educated.” He looked me square in the eye as he spoke and I had the feeling that was the truth. “Do you have a suspect for me?”

  “I have so many suspects for you.” I made a slashing gesture with my hand to imply I didn’t know where to start. “Didn’t you get anything good at the ‘kill, maim or forgive’ game at the academy?”

  “Disappointingly, no. I thought maybe our killer might slip up somehow in their admission but it was not to be.”

  “I was hoping the same when we questioned everyone about Gracie’s death as a ‘role play’” – I made air quotes around the phrase – “assessment but that didn’t work out either.”

  Officer Leonard pressed his lips together and nodded. “It’s frustrating when that happens, isn’t it? Where would you go from here?”

  “Well, I’d quite like to go home.”

  “In the investigation, Ms Sway,” Officer Leonard chastised with his smile still in place.

  “To be honest, I thought it was Jenny. So, to find her murdered is quite the inconvenience.”

  Officer Leonard inclined his head. “Why would you think that?”

  “I didn't really like her all that much.”

  “That's the only reason?” Officer Leonard asked after a pause.

  “Pretty much.”

  “But you like Matthew?”

  “Not particularly.”

  “So why didn’t he make your suspect list?”

  I raised my eyebrows at Officer Leonard. “Have you met him? I have shoes smarter than him.” Or I did have.

  “His lack of intellect is the only reason he didn’t make your list?”

  “Well, that and he’s a man,” I said without thinking.

  Officer Leonard watched me with a perplexed expression. “What does his being a man have to do with anything?”

  “Because of the—” I waggled my hand at him to remind him of the most likely female hand that had pulled me to my feet and then cut myself off when I realised he didn’t know since I’d neglected to mention that nugget in my statement.

  Officer Leonard watched my still waving hand. “Because of the … dancing hand?”

  “No, silly.” I waved my hand around in the air in a
circular motion that ended with me tapping my temple. “I’m telepathic.” It was a poor cover. I knew it. But it was the best I could have done at that moment.

  He raised his eyebrows at me. “That’s a handy trick. And it tells you our killer is a woman?”

  I gave him a one-shoulder shrug. “Possibly.”

  “Possibly?”

  “There’s definitely a fifty per cent chance it’s a woman.”

  Officer Leonard leaned closer and stared into my pupils. “You’ve not been drinking, have you, Ms Sway?”

  “Oh, I wish," I said with a roll of my eyes. “I would kill for a mojito right about now.”

  Officer Leonard raised an eyebrow and then cast a glance at the crowd still hovering around Jenny’s body. “Really?”

  I nodded vehemently and then realised what I’d said and my nod awkwardly turned into a head shake. “Nope. Jenny didn’t have any mojitos on her, otherwise I might have considered it.”

  Officer Leonard gave me a real smile. “If your telepathy volunteers up a name to go with that gender, you’ll let me know?”

  “Okay, but you’re going to have to give me half of your salary for this month.”

  Officer Leonard nodded. “Since half of nothing is nothing that seems like a good deal to me.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “You guys don’t get paid either?” He shook his head. “This place sucks.” I watched the group. “So who’s your money on?”

  He glanced back over his shoulder at the group again. “What’s your take on Mr McCaw?”

  “Ohhhh, so you just take all my information and give me nothing back?”

  “All your information? Because with your assertion that the killer is either a man or a woman I now have the key piece of information I needed to make an arrest?” Officer Leonard gave me a flat stare and then jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Mr McCaw?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know who that is.”

  “The boy with all the metal in his face.”

  “Oh, you mean Warren? My take? I take him for an idiot.”

  “Really?” Officer Leonard arched an eyebrow. “Nothing special about him at all?”

  I didn’t like the way Officer Leonard asked. He asked like he suspected there was more to Warren than facial piercings and an attitude. I wasn’t going to be the one to tell him exactly what that “more” was.

  I shrugged. “He’s not really my type.”

  Officer Leonard laughed under his breath. “So, you’ve got nothing for me?”

  “Hey, I gave you ‘female’.”

  “You gave me fifty per cent chance it’s a female,” he corrected. “Care to up your percentage?”

  I winced. I wasn’t entirely convinced it was a woman but the more I thought about the hand, the more it felt like a woman’s hand. But maybe that’s because of Edith’s and Sabrina’s assumption. I just didn’t know anymore. “I’ll go no higher than seventy-five.”

  “I’ll take it.” Officer Leonard smiled at me. “Are you sure you wouldn’t like to add a name into the mix?”

  “Actually, now you mention it,” I said, wagging my finger at him. “There’s this woman called Jessica. I think she’d be a really good place to start. You’d probably need to interrogate her with extreme force. Maybe electroshock. Definitely some face slaps.”

  “You wouldn’t be trying to set me on her because she called you a witch, would you, Ms Sway?”

  I shook my head, keeping my eyes wide and innocent. “Absolutely not. That would be spiteful of me.”

  Officer Leonard gave me one of his rare, real smiles. “Here comes the cavalry.”

  Oz stormed through the trees. His eyes focused on Officer Leonard’s back. “I know you’re not questioning my ward without me being present.”

  “Of course not, Officer Salier. Ms Sway and I were just catching up off the record. But since you’re here now—” Officer Leonard glanced over his shoulder at the melee that was the rest of the assessment group wailing and shouting and trying to explain what happened. “Numerous people have quoted Ms Sway threatening them.”

  “If you’re going to throw accusations her way then this better be on the record so we have cause for harassment,” Oz said, sitting down next to me. I noticed him give me a subtle once over to check I was physically unharmed.

  “Do you feel harassed, Ms Sway?” Officer Leonard asked. “By the GBs or me in particular?”

  “By you? No. By Detective Johnson? A little. By the murderer?” I nodded for emphasis. “A lot.”

  “Why do they think you threatened them?” Officer Leonard’s voice wasn’t cajoling, he was just straightforward asking, playing it straight now Oz was here.

  “Because I told those idiots” – I jerked my thumb in the direction of all the assessment group members throwing accusatory looks my way – “not to split up and go traipsing around the woods, in a cemetery, at night, because they were likely to get murdered. I told Jenny and Matthew to wait for them all to return or call everyone back. They didn’t listen.”

  “And now Jenny is dead.” Officer Leonard looked me square in the eyes. “Because she didn’t listen to you.”

  “That sounds like an accusation to me,” Oz warned.

  Officer Leonard inclined his head and held up a hand as an apology. “It was a statement of fact.”

  Oz leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “A fact manipulated to imply Bridget’s guilt.”

  “No.” Officer Leonard shook his head. “Just stated in a way you don’t like.”

  “It’s funny how you always seem to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, isn’t it, Miss Sway?” Detective Johnson strolled up to join the party and loomed over me. “Almost criminal, one could say.”

  “It’s funny you should phrase it that way.” Officer Leonard looked up at him. “I would say she always seems to be in the right place.”

  Johnson scowled at Officer Leonard. Obviously their cooperation had been short lived. Johnson jerked his head in the direction of the rest of the group. “How come you didn’t follow everyone else into the forest?”

  “Bridget’s already given her statement to the first officer on the scene,” Oz said.

  Johnson fixed Oz with a glare that I was sure had broken lesser men. It rolled right off Oz. “I’m asking her to clarify a few points so I understand it better.”

  “I’m not stupid,” I said, and all three men turned to look at me. “That’s why I didn’t go into the forest. Because I’m not stupid.”

  “And why did you think the clearing would be safer?” Johnson asked.

  I shrugged. “I didn’t necessarily. I just figured that I’d have a better chance of surviving if I had more room to move.”

  Johnson frowned. “Move what?”

  I stared at him. “Move about. Y’know, dodge those killer blows to the head? Those killer stabs to the abdomen?”

  “It’s also a handy alibi since it puts you out of the kill zone, so to speak,” he said.

  “Yeah, it’s a great alibi, totally solid.” I nodded. “It’s not like any of the other thirty people couldn’t have popped back into the clearing at any point while I was off killing Jenny and noticed I wasn’t there.”

  Johnson pointed his notebook at me. “So! You admit you killed her?”

  “Alright. Time to go.” Oz stood and offered me his hand. His eyes told me to take it without complaint. United front and all. I took it and he helped me up.

  Johnson placed his outstretched hand dangerously close to Oz’s chest. “Hold up there, Salier, we were just getting a confession.”

  “What you were

  is on my nerves,” I said with a sigh and looked around at the three faces staring at me. “Oh. Did I say that out loud? I’m sorry. I’m tired. Murdering all these people is exhausting.”

  Officer Leonard dipped his head, I assumed to hide his smile, but Johnson glowered at me. “No one can confirm you were in the clearing.”

  “No one can confirm I wasn’t,” I said. “Oh
, wait. Warren saw me there, before the screams.”

  “Ah yes, the boy who faked his death and blamed you.” Johnson flipped through his notes. “Interesting that of all the people he could have blamed for his fake murder, it was you.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, it’s weird, isn’t it? It’s not as if I’m the girl who keeps finding dead bodies in her locker or anything. Actually, one of my housemates made an excellent point the other evening. They said that with the rate I find bodies in my locker, it wouldn’t be long until I stumbled on the murderer stuffing one in. Then I’d be next.”

  “Oh, I don’t think so, Ms Sway.” Officer Leonard grinned. “You don’t strike me as the type of girl that would let herself be murdered.”

  I wagged my finger at him. “You should probably mention that to the bus.”

  “The bus didn’t murder you.” Officer Leonard winked at me and began walking away. “You can take her home, Officer Salier.”

  “Why thank you so much, Officer Leonard,” Oz said, his tone heavy with sarcasm. Officer Leonard heard it because he threw another smile over his shoulder at us.

  “I’m not done,” Johnson said.

  “We all have our problems today, don’t we?” I turned my back on him and let Oz lead me back to the path and all the way home.

  ∞

  I was expecting to land in the garden when Oz tunnelled us home but instead we landed in the centre of my bedroom.

  “How can you tunnel into here?”

  “Emergencies,” he said, checking under my bed, in the bathroom, under my dressing table. He headed for wardrobe.

  I watched him. “What are you doing?”

  He stopped and narrowed his eyes at me. “What are you doing?”

  I sat on the bed. “I’m asking you what you’re doing. What are you doing?”

  His eyes flicked from me to the wardrobe and back to me. “What am I going to find in there?”

  I shrugged. “Dead bodies. It’s where I like to keep them so they’re readily available to shove into my locker.”

  Oz opened the wardrobe doors. “There’s nothing in here.”

  I nodded solemnly. “I know. It’s a travesty.”

  He cursed softly and closed them again. He rested his forehead against the wood. I was guessing that wasn’t his happy stance. He stayed like that for maybe a minute. I wasn’t really sure what he was mad about since I hadn’t done anything wrong today, really. Apart from associate with an outlaw and partially haunt a travel agent. Neither he knew about.