“Like what?” Sabrina asked.
“Maybe one of the nurses at Mendall is supplying drugs to the black market and the dead guys found out about it,” I suggested.
“What would this drug baron be getting in return for the drugs?” Sabrina asked. “And couldn’t said drug baron just tunnel into a drug den in the alive world and steal all the drugs from them and sort out a distribution process through a network of facilitators? That would be much easier than trying to steal from a mental asylum.”
I shook my head at Sabrina. “You would make such an amazing supervillain.”
Sabrina waved me off. “You’re such a flatterer.”
“What if Lily remembered her death wrong? Or we misinterpreted what she meant by saying Katie’s name?” I asked. “Didn’t you say that Timothy had reported arguments between Katie and Lily before Lily’s death?”
“You’re thinking that maybe Katie followed Lily to try to talk her out of the affair or something and just found her. Maybe it was more like ‘Oh, Katie, please help me.’ Rather than ‘Oh, no, Katie, please don’t kill me’,” Sabrina suggested.
“But isn’t that coming back to the assumption that Katie isn’t responsible for the first rash of murders?” Alex asked, rubbing his eyes. “Is anyone else getting dizzy?”
“Gary said he knew who Lily was having an affair with,” I said.
“Maybe he didn’t know the whole time. Maybe he only just found out and that’s why he’s dead now instead of being dead then,” Sabrina offered. “Or maybe he didn’t know at all and was just saying that to get you alone but the killer assumed that he did.”
“Okay, how about we get this information to the police and let them untangle it?” Alex asked and suddenly I became very interested in my biscuits.
Sabrina watched me picking at the corner of my custard cream and sighed. “When did you tell him?”
“You’ve already told the police?” Alex asked.
“No, she’s told her parole officer.” Sabrina shook her head at me. I got the feeling it was more out of pity than annoyance.
“I was telling him about the footprints in the garden. I figured he should probably know about that and then …” I made a circular motion with my hand near my mouth, implying that the words had tumbled out.
“What’s he doing about it?” Alex asked.
“I imagine he’s trying to work out a way to tell the police without getting Bridget in trouble.” Sabrina shook her head and mumbled something about how emotions cloud good judgement.
“But what’s he going to tell them?” Alex asked.
“This looks intense,” Dr Mendall said almost in my ear and all three of us jumped.
“Dr Mendall,” Alex said by way of greeting and the words couldn’t have sounded more like a guilty conscience if Alex had just volunteered the fact we’d been discussing his probability of murdering people.
“Hey guys,” Burt said with a nod as he headed past us in Anna’s direction.
“I’m glad to see you three are getting along,” Mendall said. I was pretty sure from the smile on his face he heard Alex’s guilty conscience but I guessed most of his patients who were slated for release would’ve reacted the same way. “I was disappointed that we haven’t seen you these past two days, Bridget. I signed off on both of your visitor requests. Any particular reason for not coming back?”
I gave him my best professional smile. “Time constraints.”
He nodded. “I imagine finding all those dead bodies must be time consuming. If you were to find some space in your schedule it would be lovely to have you back. We could perhaps schedule a joint therapy session for you and Alex to work through any lingering issues.”
“That’s very kind of you, doctor, but I think Alex and I are on manageable terms.”
“You might want to mention that to your friend, Officer Leonard.” Mendall leaned in and lowered his voice. “He fast-tracked both requests for you. Which was really unnecessary. All you had to do was ask.”
I focused very hard on Dr Mendall’s face and pretended I hadn’t seen Sabrina nearly swallow her tongue at the revelation. “I wasn’t aware of that, doctor. Next time I see him I will absolutely let him know. And thank you for your kind offer.”
“Initially, it did make me think you were an undercover GB,” he admitted, “and then I saw you with your adjustment companion.”
“Oh, I’m sorry for your loss,” I said, his comment about Anna bringing me back to where we were and why. “You and Timothy looked like good friends.”
“We were.” Mendall nodded and glanced around the group. “I do hope they catch Katie before she hurts someone else. I blame myself for not seeing the signs earlier.”
“What signs?” Sabrina asked.
“I thought we were getting through to her but I don’t think she has ever really admitted her part in Lily’s death.” Mendall smiled sadly.
“Maybe because she wasn’t responsible for Lily’s death,” Sabrina suggested.
Mendall focused on Sabrina as if seeing her for the first time. “Maybe you should join Alex and Bridget for a session. What was your name?”
“Everyone?” Eleanor called from the front of the group. “Can I have your attention, please? We’re about to start.”
“We’re about to start,” Sabrina repeated and turned back around to face the front like a good well-adjusted person.
“I’ll catch up with you three later.” Mendall backed up a step and moved toward the front of the gathering.
“Nearly outed yourself as a fellow maladjust there,” I mumbled to Sabrina.
Before we could talk any further Eleanor called the meeting to order. We sat quietly as a few people got up and said nice things about Timothy, but by the sound of the platitudes they either didn’t know him that well or they didn’t like him that much. Then we had a minute of silence with bowed heads. I could feel Sabrina using that time to scan the crowd for anyone acting suspiciously. Like maybe someone scanning the crowd.
“Now, we get to do something fun. Everyone up.” Eleanor wafted her hands in an upward motion to encourage people to get up. “To the maze!” she said and gestured dramatically to the mass of privet.
Everyone seemed excited by this prospect. Everyone but me. And Sabrina. Even Alex seemed somewhat sceptical about it.
“Is it just me,” he said as we followed the excited horde toward the green monstrosity, “or does it seem a touch foolish to send a whole group of people into a maze when there’s a killer on the loose?”
Sabrina and I exchanged a glance.
“Is it just me,” Sabrina said, looking Alex over before turning back to me, “or is he starting to talk like us?”
I gestured between them. “I agree with both of you.”
“I’m a-maz-ing at mazes. Get it?” said the blonde one of the Alibie duo as they entered the maze ahead of us, and I couldn’t help but snarl at her back. She must have felt it somehow because she turned around. She looked from me to Sabrina and then to Alex. “Hey, why don’t you come with us?” she asked Alex and reached out to him to pull him along before he could argue.
“You don’t want to go with her,” the brunette whispered to Alex as they dragged him along the privet corridor, casting numerous backward glances our way. “She finds dead bodies everywhere she goes.”
Alex threw an impeaching look our way but Sabrina and I just waved him off.
“Should we have explained to them they would’ve stood a better chance of survival if they were with you?” Sabrina asked.
I shook my head. “I already have Anna stuck on me like a leech. I don’t need those two dogging my every step so no one murders them. If they were around me all the time I might murder them.”
Someone gasped behind me and I turned to see another member of our GA group whose name I didn’t know scurrying away in the opposite direction. He cast furtive glances over his shoulder as he went, as if I were suddenly going to pull out a meat cleaver and chase him down.
“Are you reaching for a secret lever or something?”
“I’m touching wood that nobody murders Alibie,” I explained.
“I’m sure Debbison will be just fine,” she said and pointed ahead of us, implying that was the way to go. “Are we going to talk about how Alex is technically a suspect?”
“Is he, though?” I asked. “I don’t think he was involved with Lily in any way. And we still need to ask him to sneak out something that belong to Katie so we can summon her, capture her, save the day and be adequately punished for it.”
Sabrina pointed to me. “That’s true, we do. But none of that means he’s not a suspect for these new murders.”
I pulled Sabrina to a stop. “So, are you saying these new murders are connected to the previous murders or not?’
“I’m saying, y’know, maybe.”
“Well, I’m glad we cleared that up,” I mumbled, following Sabrina along the privet corridor and turning right. Then left. Then left. Then right. The way she was turning corners without deliberating other avenues gave me the sense she knew where we were going. I followed Sabrina for maybe two whole minutes of turns until we walked into a dead end corridor. She stopped abruptly and threw her hands in the air.
“Someone’s broken the maze.” Sabrina looked around at the privet on every side except for the way we’d come. “This place is like Hogwarts.”
“Okay, I don’t know what that means,” I said, watching her investigate the hedge in front of us to see if there was a way through.
Sabrina turned back, her mouth hanging ajar. “You’ve never read Harry Potter?”
“No, I had a life,” I retorted. “The longer I’m dead the more I realise maybe it wasn’t a great life but it was definitely one too full to spend time reading about an orphan boy with a funny shaped scar on his face who was rescued from his mean muggle family to live in a magical school castle.”
Sabrina arched an eyebrow at me. “But you never read the books?”
I shrugged. “I may have accidentally seen the films.”
“Uh-huh.” Sabrina nodded and turned back to studying the privet walls, trying to peer through the one on the right. “I just don’t understand this. This should’ve led to another T-junction.”
“Did you Google map this maze?” Suddenly, her decisive corner turning made sense.
She turned back to me. “How many times have I told you? You always need to have an escape plan.”
“How did you know we’d be in here tonight?” I asked.
Sabrina shrugged. “I didn’t but I saw it last time we were here and thought it might be a great place to tunnel to and hide, should we get stalked by a crazy murderer again. Or, it might be handy to know a way out in case we somehow ended up in here.”
“Okay, well, if you’d mentioned this was your plan I could’ve told you they somehow manage to change this maze every year, so Google maps don’t work.”
“That sounds like experience talking.”
“It is. I did this maze every year for my five years in high school. No one ever completed it.”
“Really?” Sabrina asked. “What’s the point of having a maze you can’t complete?”
“To mock people as they try?” I offered. “Besides, we only ever had an hour to do it and most kids used it as a chance for some end of term privacy.”
“Well, since that doesn’t apply to us, how about we try the old two lefts and a right tactic?”
“Sure.” I’d never heard of it but it sounded a little more scientific than plain guessing.
Two lefts and a right later she pulled me to a stop.
“Did you hear that?” She tilted her head to the side, much like Oz did when he was trying to identify whether I was being truthful or not.
“What?” I couldn’t really hear anything. The privet worked to insulate sound.
“It sounded like …” Sabrina darted off around the corner ahead. I followed. She stopped abruptly and I ran right into the back of her.
I peered over her shoulder. “To be super clear you found the body this time.”
Chapter Fifteen
I followed Sabrina to the prone form lying face down on the grass. Sabrina jerked to a stop when we were still a few metres away.
“What?” I asked as I moved around her to get a better look. “Oh. Maybe you were right. Maybe it is Alibie after all.”
“Or maybe he’s faking?” Sabrina suggested as she stepped closer and peered along the back of Alex’s body. “There’s no blood.”
“Maybe he’s been stabbed in the chest and is right now bleeding out,” I suggested.
Sabrina bent to the side to try to look underneath him. “Doesn’t look like it to me.”
“Okay, so what do you want to do?” I asked, resting my hands on my hips. “Just stand here and wait to see if he attacks us?”
Sabrina gave a half-hearted shrug and made a non-committal sound that sounded a lot like a yes to me.
“Why would he attack us?” I asked. “He’s helped us.”
“Realistically, how much help has he actually been? And maybe he’s not forgiven you for killing Bertha,” Sabrina suggested.
“I didn’t kill Bertha!”
“Maybe he’s not convinced of that. Maybe he’s been playing the long game to get out of the asylum and wait for the perfect moment to attack you. Maybe he’s been the killer all along, just taking out random people to deflect suspicion from himself so we’d trust him and he could get us alone and brutally murder us.”
“Or maybe he’s speeding toward his second death right now.”
“I’m not a fan of this new Bridget.” Sabrina stepped back and looked me over. “She seems a little cavalier with her safety.”
“Are you going to help me or just stand there and criticise?” I asked as I moved to hover by the side of Alex’s head.
“Pretty sure I can do both at the same time,” Sabrina mumbled as she pulled a stun gun from her pocket.
“Alex. Fair warning. If you’re faking right now and you try to kill me, you and I are going to have a serious falling out. And Sabrina will likely stun you. Severely. Okay?” I asked. He didn’t respond. I glanced back to Sabrina. She shrugged then aimed the stun gun at him, ready to shoot him if he moved.
I crouched down by his head and shook his shoulder. “Alex?” No response. I shook it again. “Alex?” Still nothing. “Do you think it would be okay if I tried to turn him over?”
“Either he’s dead or he’s about to jump up and try and kill you. I don’t think flipping him onto his back is going to be that big of an issue.”
I spared Alex a quick glance before turning back to Sabrina. “I don’t want to cripple him, though.”
“Well, your options are to leave him face down or flip him, so what do you want to do?”
I reached out to push him on to his back and then stopped. I was sure I’d read somewhere that moving someone who’d been in an accident could cause serious harm. Though being stabbed in the chest was hardly an accident. That was if he’d been stabbed in the chest which I had no reason to believe he had. Sabrina sighed heavily at my indecision. She bent down, stun gun still in hand, nodded at me and we rolled him onto his back.
We both jumped quickly away but he made no move to murder us. We waited. We exchanged a glance and then waited some more. I turned to Sabrina and she shrugged again. I moved to crouch back over him. I couldn’t see anything that looked like a wound.
“Maybe he just fainted,” I said.
“So wake him up,” Sabrina said.
“How?” I asked and Sabrina mimed slapping him. I stared at her. “You want me to slap a possibly dead person?”
“How is that worse than slapping an alive person? If he’s dead, he won’t feel it. If he’s alive it will wake him up.”
“Suppose that does make a sort of sense.�
��
“Get slapping.” Sabrina affected a ready stance with both hands on her stun gun.
I stood to the side and reached down to gently tap Alex’s cheek. Nothing happened. I tried again. Still nothing.
“For god’s sake, do it properly!” Sabrina exclaimed. “That wouldn’t wake him up if he was just sleeping.”
“Fine,” I said, throwing a scowl over my shoulder at her. I planted a foot either side of his shoulder. I pulled my arm back and let my hand fly. My hand struck his cheek with a thick sound and Alex’s head bounced off the floor. I peered into his face. His eyes twitched, but stayed closed. With one hand, he reached up as he gingerly lifted his head off the ground so he could touch the back of it.
I turned to grin at Sabrina, who rolled her eyes at me. When I turned back I stared right into Alex’s open eyes. Startled, I reared back. Several thoughts twitched across Alex’s face. And then he launched at me. He grabbed me by my waist and had me flat on the floor with his hands around my neck before I even realised what was happening.
A whole heap of self-defence instincts kicked in and I jerked my knee up and into his groin while making a sharp punch to his throat. It was enough to startle him into loosening his hold. Sabrina’s foot connected with his ribs. The impact knocked him off me. I scrambled backward and stood several feet away from a gasping Alex as he pushed himself to his feet. Still breathing heavily, he stared at us. The whole episode took seconds.
“Why?” he coughed out.
“What do you mean why?” I screeched. “Why wouldn’t I let you strangle me?”
“Kinda feel that’s self-explanatory, if you ask me,” Sabrina said and then turned to me. “I told you.”
“Yes, you were right.” I gave her a congratulatory pat on the shoulder. “Well done. But do you think you can be smug about that later when we’ve dealt with this situation? Would that be okay?”
“That condescending tone doesn’t sound like you’re grateful to me,” Sabrina mumbled.
“Deal with what situation?” Alex asked, his voice still hoarse.
A Little More Dead Page 22