Be Careful What You Wish For (Amber Fox Mystery No 2)

by Sibel Hodge

  ‘I’ve got lots of talents.’ Tia shrugged. ‘And actually, it was you who blew things up when we did the spells.’

  ‘You made me!’

  My mobile rang before I could say anything else on the matter. ‘Hi, Dad,’ I said, glancing at my watch. ‘I haven’t forgotten about lunch. I’ll be there in half an hour.’

  ‘Good. I have a present for you.’

  I thought back to the nose, the spiders, and the fox. I’d had enough presents lately to last a lifetime. ‘Is it a nice present?’

  ‘Sabre finally pooped out the memory card. Along with two socks and quite a few prunes.’

  ****

  The smell of garlic chicken and mashed potatoes wafted towards me as I stepped into my parents’ kitchen.

  ‘I’m starving.’ I kissed Mum and Dad and sat down at the island. ‘No Suzy today? I thought she was coming.’

  Mum squeezed lemon juice and olive oil on the salad. ‘No, she’s not coming. She’s got a new man!’ She smiled at me. ‘She’s having lunch with him.’

  ‘Maybe the new man will loosen her up a bit.’ I grinned, secretly glad she wouldn’t be here to have a go at me for having commitment phobia, which she always enjoyed dragging up. Suzy was the most serious person I’d ever known. Maybe it was because she was a psychologist. Not a lot to smile about when you got inside the heads of some people. It was scary enough in my head, and I wasn’t nuts. Well, maybe slightly nuts.

  ‘No disguise today, then?’ I eyed Dad who was dressed normally for once in cord trousers and a black shirt. I’d almost forgotten what he looked like in ordinary clothes. ‘I’ve kind of got used to seeing you dressed as a woman or a tramp.’

  Dad glanced at mum and a secret look passed between them. He carried the plates to the breakfast bar and set out knives and forks. ‘I’m going to be spending more time at home from now on. We’re even going on holiday.’

  Mum winked at me. It seemed like everything was back on track with them again.

  ‘Where are you off to? God, I could do with a holiday as well.’ I picked up a spoon and dished some scrummy food on my plate.

  ‘Maybe Paris. Maybe Rome,’ Mum said wistfully as she sat next to me. ‘We haven’t decided yet. I’ve always wanted to go to Paris. The city of romance.’

  Dad kissed her on the cheek and sat down too. ‘We’re going to have a second honeymoon.’

  ‘Great. That’s a fantastic idea,’ I said.

  ‘And what about you?’ Mum raised an eyebrow. ‘Have you decided what to do about Romeo?’

  I forked some chicken in my mouth so I wouldn’t have to answer, but she wasn’t giving up that easily.

  ‘Well?’ She prompted me.

  ‘Brad asked me to marry him.’ I piled more mash on my plate.

  Dad nearly choked on a chunk of chicken.

  Mum put her fork down, staring at me. ‘What are you going to do? And don’t say you don’t know. It’s high time you made a proper decision about both of them. I know you.’ She picked up her fork and pointed it at me. ‘Yes, Romeo is one in a million, but I know you’ll never get over Brad. What have you got to lose by marrying him?’

  ‘Er…my sanity?’

  Dad patted my hand. ‘I know Brad hurt you before. But you can’t keep living in the past. He’s not in the SAS anymore. It’s not like he has to disappear on a job for months on end. Why not take a chance?’

  ‘Funny,’ I gazed at both of them. ‘That’s what he said, too.’

  Dad gave my hand a quick squeeze. ‘When you’re working for the SAS you’re not allowed to discuss certain things in case it compromises their missions. Even with their nearest and dearest. It’s not that different from being a cop.’ He gave me a knowing look. ‘You won’t have that problem again, though, anyway. His business is doing really well so it’s unlikely that he’s going to get involved in any other secret missions and leave you in the lurch.’

  ‘You know it’s not always going to be a bed of roses,’ Mum said. ‘But you can’t shy away from commitment because you’ve been hurt before. If everyone in the world did that, the majority of the population would never have a relationship again!’

  I couldn’t reply because I knew she was right. I munched on some salad and listened instead.

  ‘A relationship takes a lot of hard work and compromise.’ Mum glanced at Dad when she said this. ‘But if you really love each other, and I know you and Brad do, then you can get through anything.’ She reached over and clasped Dad’s hand, a proud smile on her face.

  Dad smiled back at her, then turned to me. ‘I think you should marry Brad. You’ll never be completely happy until you do.’

  ‘I agree,’ Mum said. ‘I know it’s an important decision, but it’s not like you haven’t had enough time to think about it happening before now. He proposed to you years ago and you accepted.’

  ‘Yes, but that was before he upped and left me without a word. And look what happened!’

  ‘You should have talked to him when he got back from his mission.’ Mum apparently wasn’t going to let this go. ‘You shouldn’t have shut him out like that. If you’d talked to him about it all then, you could’ve worked it out ages ago.’ She reached over and patted my hand, her voice softening. ‘I know you can’t live without him.’

  I groaned and flopped my head in my hands. ‘But what about Romeo? I love him, too. And I feel terrible that I’m going to break his heart when he’s been nothing but loving and kind and patient with me.’

  ‘I know Romeo’s a lovely guy, and he’s always been good for you, but I know you, Amber Fox. I can tell there’s something missing between you and Romeo. Whereas when you were with Brad, you seemed to have the whole package. Brad’s your soul mate.’ Mum stroked my hair. ‘They don’t come along very often. You should grab the chance while you still can.’ She paused for a breath. ‘So?’ She tilted her head. ‘Do I need to buy a hat? You said you needed a holiday. You could have a honeymoon and kill two birds with one stone.’

  Hint, hint.

  ‘Where’s the memory card?’ I couldn’t take any more of this so I changed the subject pretty quick.

  Mum rolled her eyes at me.

  Dad nodded his head towards a sealed plastic bag on the kitchen worktop. ‘Don’t worry, I cleaned it. I think you owe me for that unpleasant job.’

  I seemed to owe everyone lately.

  ‘I’m not sure if it will still work, though, after where it’s been.’ Dad pulled a face.

  ‘Where is Sabre anyway?’ I asked.

  ‘I think he’s all pooped out. He’s been asleep for hours.’ Mum pushed her plate away. ‘So, about this honeymoon. Where do you want to go? How about somewhere exotic? I hear Thailand is nice this time of year.’ She had a wicked glint in her eye.

  ****

  ‘Has this really been through Sabre’s stomach?’ Hacker asked when I handed the memory card to him.

  ‘And a few other places, too,’ I said. ‘Do you think it will still work?’

  He slotted it into a hard drive and waited. ‘Let’s see.’ He did a few keyboard commands that looked like gibberish to me and the pictures came up on his screen. ‘Which one do you want me to look at?’

  I pointed at the thumbnail of the man in the baseball cap coming out of Deborah’s house.

  Hacker enlarged it on the screen. The picture was still grainy and fuzzy, and the guy’s head was tilted downwards with the baseball cap covering too much of his face to make out who he was.

  ‘I’ll manipulate it and see what I can find.’ His fingers were off and running, calling up a photographic program.

  ‘Where’s Brad?’ I asked.

  ‘He’s gone to your place to get some of your stuff.’

  Tia poked her head around the door. ‘Amber, Carole Blake is on line one for you.’

  ‘Thanks.’ I picked up my desk phone. ‘Hey, how’s it going? Have you found anything?’

  ‘Hey. Not much, really. Forensics managed to lift some footprints from around Debora
h’s body. The offender wore a size nine.’

  ‘Hmm. That narrows it down to about a squillion people in the world.’

  ‘I know. They also found traces of yellow fertilizer compound in the footprints,’ she said. ‘It’s probably not very helpful at the moment, seeing as it was scattered in the flower bed next to the rear French doors where we assumed the offender gained entry. If we find a suspect, though, we can analyse their footwear.’

  The phone slipped from my grasp and all the blood in my body pooled to my feet.

  ‘Hello? Amber, are you still there?’

  I pushed it to my ear again. ‘Carole, you’re fab. I love you! I’ve gotta go.’ I slammed the phone back down.

  ‘What?’ Hacker stared at me.

  ‘I know who killed Deborah.’ I rushed out of the office.

  Chapter 16

  Yellow fertilizer on his shoes.

  I’d seen it when I’d spilled the tea in his office. Edward had yellow-muddy stains on the soles of his scuffed shoes. Scuffed shoes. Why hadn’t I paid more attention to it? Why hadn’t I realized the significance of it before now? How could Edward Kinghorn have scuffed shoes when he couldn’t walk?

  Unless he could.

  His doctor’s report said that he should’ve eventually recovered from his injuries. What if he had recovered but never let on, pretending instead to still be disabled? He’d probably been planning on doing a permanent disappearance trick with his huge chunk of money all along. All he had to do was sit tight, make enough money to last him a lifetime, and then up and vanish. Everyone would be looking for someone in a wheelchair, not someone who could walk. What better disguise than that? No wonder Edward had lied to me about the accident. He didn’t want me to go poking around in his medical records and putting two and two together. I’d seriously underestimated him.

  I called Romeo on my mobile as I motored towards Kinghorn Thomas. I wasn’t going to tell him about us yet, but I had to tell him there was a murderer on the loose. It rang and rang before his voicemail kicked in. I left a message and pulled up outside the bank, parking at a wonky angle on double yellow lines. Sod the parking ticket. This was more important.

  I climbed the stairs to the building two at a time, rushing forward to the customer reception desk. There was a different woman on duty today.

  I said breathlessly, ‘I need to speak to Edward Kinghorn.’ Another note to self: definitely definitely join the gym.

  ‘Do you have an appointment?’ she smiled.

  ‘No!’ Which came out more high pitched than I intended. ‘It’s urgent, though. Tell him Amber Fox needs to speak to him right away.’

  She picked up the phone and murmured into it. ‘His secretary will be right down,’ she said. ‘Have a seat.’ She pointed to the same comfy looking chairs as before.

  ‘Thanks.’ I took a seat and tapped my foot.

  I looked at my watch. Then I looked at my mobile to make sure I still had a signal so that Romeo could get hold of me.

  I stood up.

  Edward’s secretary waltzed towards me.

  I rushed up to her. ‘I need to speak to him immediately.’

  ‘You’re too late.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘He’s already left. He said he had a family emergency he had to deal with.’ She gave me a puzzled look.

  I’m not sure if she caught my “thanks” because I’d already bolted half way to the door like a sprinter out of the blocks.

  I got Edward’s home address from Hacker and told him to call Brad and get him to meet me there.

  ‘I put marker flags on all the airlines in case any of Edward’s family or friends booked a ticket, like you asked,’ Hacker told me as I negotiated a corner with one hand on the wheel and one on my phone. Not ideal, I know, but under the circumstances, I didn’t have time to fiddle around putting my mobile on hands-free.

  ‘You know the traffic accident that injured his spine?’ Hacker said.

  ‘Yes, I know all that. Get to the good bit.’ I switched my mobile to my other hand as I zoomed around a roundabout, narrowly avoiding a collision with a van that had a sticker on the back saying, Am I Driving Carefully?

  ‘I’ve discovered something very interesting. Edward’s got a twin brother called James, and James just booked a ticket to Rio from Heathrow Airport.’

  ‘What’s that got to do with the accident?’

  ‘Well, Edward was driving when the accident happened, but his brother was also in the car. James died from his injuries, so unless he’s been reincarnated, how come he’s booking a plane ticket? There’s also an account in a Rio bank in James’s name with one and a half billion dollars in it.’

  Clever Edward. Very clever and premeditated. No wonder he told me it was a skiing accident that injured his spine. Edward could now disappear using his brother’s identity and no one would’ve been any the wiser. Well, Valentine’s Night four years ago was certainly a bad night for the Kinghorn and Thomas families.

  ‘How weird that both Edward’s brother and Carl Thomas’s sister died from car accidents on the same day. I mean they were about four miles and a couple of hours apart but…’ I shook my head to myself. I always said I didn’t believe in coincidences. Or were they not just random accidents, at all. ‘Good work, Hacker’ I said. ‘But how did you find out about it? There wasn’t anything on Janie Skipper’s accident report that mentioned someone else in the car.’

  ‘After you said her report was flawed in some way, I checked into other police accident reports from that night. She filed a separate one for James Thomas and didn’t link them together. James was apparently dead at the scene when she arrived.’

  Damn bloody Janice! What was she playing at? All persons involved in a traffic accident should’ve been filed on the same report. She was even more of an idiot than I thought. Or had she been covering it up all along? If she was being paid off by Vinnie or Edward, maybe one of them had asked her to stuff up the accident reports so Edward could do a runner in the future with no one noticing. I tucked that thought in my frontal lobe to dissect later.

  ‘What time does the flight leave?’ I asked.

  ‘It leaves in three hours.’

  ‘Shit.’ I slammed my foot down on the accelerator.

  I hung up and called Romeo.

  Come on, come on, pick up!

  He didn’t, so I left an updated message, telling him to meet me at Edward’s house, and motored the Toyota down the road like it was the Batmobile.

  I didn’t have a plan. I just had to stop him getting to the airport somehow. I hadn’t hung around at the bank to ask his secretary when he’d left, but I was hoping it wasn’t long ago. If Edward had only just booked this flight, then I was also hoping he was in the middle of packing. And if I could catch him by surprise…

  Edward’s house was a single storey barn conversion, arranged in an L-shape. From the front garden, I could see above some one-metre tall hedges into a small courtyard garden at the side of the property, decked out in lots of patio slabs and potted plants. I turned my mobile phone to silent and shoved it in my back pocket as I bypassed the front door, which had a wheelchair ramp, and inched my way along the hedges, ducking down to avoid being seen.

  I unlatched a small gate into the courtyard and peeked through.

  Luck was on my side for once. No one was around and the curtains were all closed.

  The good news was that it would aid me trying to sneak into the house. The bad news was that I didn’t know exactly where Edward was. You see, a superhuman power of making myself invisible would’ve come in pretty handy at that moment.

  I had two doors to choose from: a wooden barn door to what I thought would be the kitchen, or patio doors to what was probably a bedroom.

  I stood, listening for any sounds of life from within the house. The only thing I could hear was the persistent chirp of a robin.

  I wiped a bead of sweat from my forehead, pulled out my SIG from the back of my jeans, and crept across the grass. Gras
ping Brad’s open sesame tool in one hand, I clenched my jaw in nervous anticipation.

  The locks on the patio doors to the bedroom looked easier to pick, but it could leave me more vulnerable and I wanted the element of surprise. I tried the handle of the barn door, just in case.

  Wey-hey! What do you know! It was unlocked.

  I stuffed Brad’s tool in my front pocket, eased the door open with one hand, my other firmly gripping my gun.

  Peering inside, I discovered a traditional country style kitchen. It was empty.

  Standing statue still, I listened.

  Not a peep. The house was eerily silent.

  I pulled the door open further.

  It creaked.

  I winced. Bad news.

  My heartbeat hammered like a bass drum, reverberating in my chest as I waited for a sign that Edward had heard me and would come to investigate the source of the creaking.

  One second.

  Two seconds.

  Three seconds.

  Four seconds.

  Nothing happened. I didn’t hear any footsteps heading in my direction so I eased inside, leaving the door slightly ajar.

  Above the huge range cooker were pots and pans hanging down. They swung slightly in the breeze from the open door but that was the only sign of movement in here.

  I padded to an open doorway at the end of the kitchen, gun hand in front of me and steady. I could see it led to a corridor.

  I held my breath and poked my head through, looking both ways. Left or right? Eenie meanie miney mo.

  I figured left went towards the bedrooms and right went towards the living room.

  Left it is.

  All the doors were closed. I was just reaching out to touch the handle of one when someone grabbed me in a tight lock from behind and pressed a foul smelling rag against my nose and mouth.

  Then I lost my hearing and everything went black.

  Chapter 17

  My eyelids felt heavy, and I was sure someone was banging a pneumatic drill in my head somewhere. I tried to swallow but my throat felt like sandpaper.