by sibelhodge
‘Why have you got a single plane ticket? Why aren’t you returning to the UK?’ Dick Head peered at us as if this were highly suspicious.
‘We’re moving abroad. We’re going to live the dream.’ I gave him a wistful smile as I thought about how perfect our new life was going to be.
‘What dream?’ Goodybody said.
‘You know, we’re escaping the dreary British weather and the rat race to experience life in the sunny and relaxing Mediterranean.’ Daydreams rapidly filled my head: walking hand in hand with Kalem on a sandy beach after a leisurely swim in the warm sea; sitting on our orange blossom scented, sun-baked villa terrace with a chilled glass of rosé as we watched the blazing sun set over the sea; sipping tiny cups of strong coffee in a chic waterfront café; eating succulent, freshly caught sea bass or juicy king prawns, cooked to perfection on a barbeque.
‘Your name sounds like a Muslim name. Are you a Muslim?’ Officer Head’s voice broke into my daydreams, sending me spiralling back to the reality of being stuck in a tiny, lifeless room with overpowering lights and a sweaty, stale smell. ‘Well?’ He peered at Kalem, waiting for his answer.
Kalem folded his arms casually across his chest. ‘Not really.’
‘Hmm. Not really. That’s a strange answer. What does “not really” mean?’
‘Well, my parents are Turkish Cypriot. The religion of Turkish Cypriots is Muslim, but we don’t exactly practice it or anything. Most Turkish Cypriots are relaxed in their religious practices and very tolerant of other people’s religions.’ Kalem shrugged.
I jigged my leg up and down. We were going to miss our flight. My wonderful pre-honeymoon would be ruined.
‘Is that what they told you to say?’ Goodbody leaned in closer, resting his elbows on the desk.
‘Who?’ Kalem asked.
‘Are you a member of Al-Qaeda?’ Officer Head looked deadly serious. ‘We have to be extremely vigilant these days, you know.’
‘What?’ Kalem blustered. ‘Of course not!’
‘Where are you travelling to?’ Goodbody wanted to know.
‘North Cyprus,’ I said, jigging harder. ‘We’ll miss our flight if you keep us here any longer. What’s going on?’ I whined, feeling my heart bouncing around in my chest. I was going to have a panic attack in a minute. Maybe if I fainted, they would let us go. I slouched down further in my chair, so I wouldn’t have as far to fall if I hit the ground.
‘Are you a suicide bomber?’ Dick Head growled at Kalem.
‘He’s a teacher!’ I cried.
‘And who do you teach? Terrorist cells?’ Dick Head beamed with excitement at Officer Goodbody. ‘I think we’ve got one of the Al-Qaeda’s main men here.’
Kalem shook his head in amazement. ‘I teach woodcarving and sculpture!’
‘Is that a code name of some sort?’ Goodbody asked Dick Head. ‘I seem to recall one of the Bin Laden breakaway groups had a code name like that. What was it now?’ He scratched his toilet brush head, deep in concentration. ‘Ah yes! The Splinter Group.’
‘I haven’t heard of that one before.’ Dick Head frowned. ‘But it’s possible. Woodcarving… splinter…yes, it sounds possible to me.’
‘Why are we here?’ I furrowed my brow and gazed at both of them, interrupting what seemed like the most surreal conversation I’d ever heard in my life.
Dick Head ignored my question and stood up. ‘Hand over your bags, please. I want to take a look inside.’
I gave him mine. Kalem lifted his rucksack and put it on the table in front of us.
Goodbody rummaged around in my bag with interest and then pulled out my camera. ‘Why do you need such a big camera? Are you going to be taking surveillance photos?’
‘I’m a photographer,’ I said.
‘Hmm. A likely story.’ Goodbody’s eyebrow shot up.
Dick Head started on Kalem’s rucksack, pulling out a book, a couple of apples, and a tub of edible chocolate body paint. He held up the body paint to Kalem. ‘What’s this?’ He unscrewed the lid and glared at it as if it were packed full of Semtex.
Kalem shrugged. ‘Well, it is going to be our pre-honeymoon.’
I felt my insides turn to goo. He still had that effect on me. Oh, yes, bring on the chocolate body paint!
‘Was that the surprise you were talking about?’ I said to Kalem, turning my head away from the customs men who were busy scouring our bags for hidden compartments.
Satisfied there was no Semtex, suspicious looking shoes, or packets of nails in our hand luggage, they returned their attention to us.
‘We’re going to miss our flight.’ I looked at my watch again, desperately hoping they’d hurry up.
‘Why has your passport been tampered with?’ Dick Head asked Kalem again.
‘It hasn’t,’ Kalem insisted.
‘Well what do you call that then?’ Dick Head turned the passport around to face Kalem.
I gulped and my brain did a silent mental shriek. ‘Oops,’ I squeaked, suddenly feeling nauseous.
Kalem stared at the photo section on his passport. The picture of a footballer-permed Kalem had been replaced with a picture of an old, fat, bald man with huge black square glasses.
‘I think I’m going to pass out,’ I muttered. If I caused a distraction, maybe we could just make a run for it.
‘What’s that?’ Kalem gasped, turning his head slowly to me with dread.
Dick Head and Goodbody gave me an icy glare.
‘Ah,’ I croaked. It was all my fault. How was I going to explain this one?
‘Well?’ they said in unison.
‘Erm…well…what happened was…Kalem is always playing practical jokes on me,’ I paused, thinking how this was going to sound. ‘Anyway, about four months ago I bought this hair dye…’
Goodbody snorted.
‘What does hair dye have to do with this?’ Dick Head growled.
‘It’s very relevant, actually,’ I started again, running a shaky hand through my hair. ‘So, I bought this hair dye, and when I got it home, I realized I didn’t like the colour.’ My eyes darted to Kalem, who gawped at me. ‘A few days later, I took it back to the shop and asked the woman at the counter if I could return it. But when she took the box back off me, she stared at it for a while with a puzzled look and then turned it around to show me.’
Dick Head and Goodbody had deadly straight faces.
‘Do go on. This is thoroughly enlightening,’ Goodbody said in a voice that clearly meant it wasn’t at all.
‘Well, that was when I noticed that someone had drawn a moustache and beard on the picture of the woman on the front of the box.’ I narrowed my eyes at Kalem, who chuckled under his breath, remembering.
‘Anyway, I was really embarrassed and had to pretend that it must have been like that in the shop when I’d bought it.’
‘Is there a point to this?’ Goodbody asked, glancing at his watch.
‘I wanted to get Kalem back, and I knew he was going to the building society a few days later to get some money out, and he needed to take some ID. He can never find his driving licence, so he always takes his passport,’ I paused. ‘Because I’m a photographer, obviously I’ve got loads of old photos lying around, so I thought it would be really funny to pay him back for all the practical jokes he plays on me. I found this photo, cut it out, then stuck it over his passport photo with removable adhesive and put it back in the drawer. Then, of course, I forgot all about it.’ I tried to swallow, but my throat felt like I’d swallowed a Brillo Pad. ‘Until now.’ I tucked my hair behind my ears with shaky hands.
Kalem coughed. ‘Actually, I managed to find my driving licence and took that to the building society instead.’
I cast him a sheepish look. ‘Yes, I realize that now.’
‘You see! This is all perfectly innocent,’ Kalem said to Dick Head and Goodbody. ‘Can we go now?’
‘Not yet. Are you a Muslim too?’ Goodbody asked me.
‘No, I’m not a Muslim,’ I said.
/> A confused glance passed between Dick Head and Goodbody. ‘Well you certainly look like one. Can you please explain why you’re wearing a burka if you’re not Muslim,’ Goodbody asked me.
I glanced down at the floor length, head-to-toe black burka that I’d almost forgotten I was wearing. Even if the rest of the stuff sounded slightly odd, there was at least a perfectly reasonable explanation for this.
‘Well, there’s an ancient tradition with Turkish Cypriot families. When a new bride-to-be arrives in North Cyprus to get married, it’s good luck for her to be wearing a burka, isn’t it?’ I glanced at Kalem, willing him to explain this peculiar custom further. Instead, he kind of gave me a small shake of his head, and his jaw dropped.
Oh, God. I recognized that look. There was no such custom. This was another one of his wind-Helen-up practical jokes. If they could’ve seen my face, which of course they couldn’t because I only had a two inch rectangular slit for my eyes, they would’ve seen it completely drain of colour. Luckily, they accepted this explanation, and neither of the customs officers seemed to notice that my eyelids had just pinged open in surprise or that Kalem’s face had turned a scorching-hot shade of pink.
Dick Head picked at the adhesive on Kalem’s passport photo and pulled it off, examining the official picture of Kalem underneath. ‘What do you think?’ He handed the passport to Goodbody.
‘Mmm.’ Goodbody scrutinized it. ‘It looks legitimate.’ He sounded disappointed.
‘That’s a shame,’ Dick Head huffed and turned to Officer Goodbody, frowning. ‘Seems like we’ll miss out on our CAT bonus.’
‘What’s that?’ Kalem asked.
‘Catch-a-terrorist bonus,’ Dick Head grumbled at us. It was clear from the look on his face that he’d already worked out what he was going to spend it on.
‘Can we go now?’ I pleaded.
‘OK,’ Goodbody said with much reluctance. ‘But don’t let this happen again.’
‘Thanks, Dick.’ I yanked Kalem’s arm and hurried him away to catch our plane before they changed their minds.
We arrived at the gate with minutes to spare, just as a rather harassed looking baggage handler was about to search for our luggage to offload.
OK, maybe this wasn’t exactly the kind of start to our perfect life together that I had in mind, and one day I was actually going to laugh about this, but I couldn’t allow myself to relax until we were sitting in our allocated seats and the plane was taxiing down the runway. We were on our way to an exciting destination, full of possibilities. Living a life abroad that most people just dreamed about but never got to experience. An amazing adventure that nothing was going to spoil.
Nothing will spoil my wedding. Nothing will spoil my wedding. Nothing will spoil my wedding.
Or so I thought.
The Fashion Police
The Fashion Police was a runner up in the Chapter One Promotions Novel Competition 2010 and nominated Best Novel with Romantic Elements 2010 by The Romance Reviews. It is a screwball comedy-mystery, combining murder and mayhem with romance and chick-lit. Written in a similar style to Janet Evanovich and Harlan Coben, it is Stephanie Plum meets Myron Bolitar.
Amber Fox has been making too many mistakes lately and something's got to give…
For starters, Amber accidentally shoots Chief Inspector Janice Skipper and gets thrown off the police force. The only one who knows the truth about the incident is Amber, but no one will believe her.
After accepting a job as an insurance investigator from her ex-fiancé, Brad Beckett, it turns out that Brad thinks they've still got unfinished business and the job description includes sexual favours that come with a price.
When fashion designer, Umberto Fandango, goes missing, Amber becomes embroiled in a complicated case. But Amber's arch-enemy, Chief Inspector Skipper, is also investigating his disappearance, and it's a race against time for Amber to solve the mystery before Skipper does and get her old job back. And just when Amber thinks things can't get any worse, she's being stalked by some crazy mobsters.
Who is Umberto Fandango? Is he dead? And can Amber stay one step ahead and stay alive?
Chapter One
If life is like a box of chocolates, then mine is the mother of all coffee creams. You know – the ones that always get left in the box because no one wants them? Today I felt like a coffee cream, too. On the outside I was sleek and hard, but on the inside, I was just a lump of mush.
I sat in Brad’s office, trying to ignore the queasy tingle that gurgled in the depths of my stomach. As he droned on about my assignment, I tuned him out and debated whether or not things could get any worse. I tried giving myself a pep talk, but I’m not sure it worked.
Come on, Amber, get a grip. It’s no use wishing you could get the hell out of here. You can do this new job with your eyes closed.
Suddenly, something Brad said caught my attention and I snapped back to the conversation. ‘Hang on a sec. Let me get this straight. You want me to plant some bugs?’ I asked, wondering if I’d misheard. ‘I take it we’re talking about bug bugs and not the creepy crawly variety.’ I shuddered at the thought. Spiders were a definite no-no.
Brad gave me a cool nod of agreement. The owner of Hi-Tec Insurance, Brad was a former Special Forces operative whom I’d know for years. He was also my former fiancé. I’d accepted a job as claims investigator at Hi-Tec after being let go from my position on the police force. Not the ideal situation, I know, but it paid the bills.
‘Exactly why does an insurance company want to plant bugs in its client’s offices?’ I asked as I sat back in the chair opposite Brad’s, my right leg jigging up and down like a pneumatic drill.
‘This is the twenty-first century. We’re in the proactive insurance age now,’ Brad replied.
‘So you’re trying to avoid an insurance claim before it happens?’
‘You’ve got it in one, Foxy. Claims are money, and if there’s one thing I hate, it’s losing money.’ An amused smile played around the corners of Brad’s mouth as he looked at my knee aerobics. ‘Am I making you nervous?’
I stopped jigging and gave him the eye roll to beat all eye rolls. ‘I think we’re way past the stage of you making me nervous, Brad.’ He raised an eyebrow at that but continued, handing me a manila folder as he spoke.
‘I’ve had a tip from one of my informers that this particular client is into something a bit dodgy – actually, a lot dodgy. I need to get a handle on the truth before I find myself involved in a multi-million pound insurance payout.’
I took the folder. ‘And what informer would that be?’ I asked as I flicked through the file, watching out of the corner of my eye as he rolled up his shirt sleeves. The familiar action brought a reluctant smile to my face. A suit, dress shirt and trousers didn’t fit Brad. He was more at home in desert camouflage and chunky-soled boots. As I read the client’s name, I knew my jaw had fallen to the floor but I couldn’t help it. I barely heard Brad’s response to my question.
‘The usual – the seedy, underhanded kind.’
‘Umberto Fandango, the fashion designer? He’s one of your clients?’
‘Hi-Tec Insurance has a very diverse clientele, ranging from the scum-bag lowlifes to the rich and famous ones.’ Brad rested his feet on his huge, mahogany desk, looking pretty pleased with himself. He picked a piece of fluff from his trousers, examining it with distaste before depositing it in the trash bin.
‘His bags are to die for!’ Maybe being a claims investigator wouldn’t be so boring, after all. ‘Have you seen the ones with–?’
‘Here.’ Ignoring my amazement, he tossed me a packet of black ballpoint pens.
Distracted, I examined the packet with interest. ‘What are these?’
‘The bugs are cunningly disguised as pens. I just need you to go to Umberto’s office, plant a few of these around the place, and leave the rest to me. To activate them, you just have to click the top of the pen. Do you think you can handle that?’
‘No problemo. I
’m Amber Fox, Miss Hot-Shit Investigator. I can do anything.’
Brad glanced over at my leg, which was now bouncing up and down, Space-Hopper style. ‘I’d definitely agree with the “hot” part.’ He arched an eyebrow. ‘Janice Skipper might agree with the “shit” part.’
I cringed. Janice Skipper was the reason I’d been let go from the force. She had carried a vendetta for me around for a long time, and had taken pleasure in making my life hell. To say Janice was a sore point for me was an understatement.
‘Urgh! Don’t mention that woman. If it weren’t for her–’
‘I know, Foxy – you wouldn’t be here now.’ Brad stood up and moved around the desk. ‘Come on, I’ll introduce you to Hacker. If you want anything technical done, he’s your guy.’ He strode toward me, six feet of solid muscle that backed my five-and-a-half-foot frame into the wall. He stopped mere inches away from my face.
I caught a musky waft of his aftershave and sucked in a breath. A tingling sensation erupted in my stomach.
Calm down, Amber. Nothing to worry about. You’ve just got a case of gas, that’s all. What else could that peculiar sensation be?
‘It’s good to have you back, Foxy,’ he whispered, staring down at me with haunting grey eyes. They’re the kind that are lined at the corners, giving you just a hint that he’s seen more in his forty years than most people would see in ten lifetimes.
I matched his stare pound for pound, and swallowed hard, feeling goose bumps springing to attention on my skin. My throat felt constricted and dusty. ‘Don’t call me Foxy,’ I finally managed to croak out.
‘It’s either Foxy or Sexy. You choose,’ he said. His words caused his breath to tickle my cheek.