Squirrel & Swan Suspicious Things

  S & S Investigations Book 6

  M. D. ARCHER

  SWARM Publishing

  First published in December 2022 by SWARM Publishing.

  Auckland, New Zealand.

  Copyright © 2022 by M. D. Arche

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN (kindle): 978-1-99-116702-6

  ISBNN (epub): 978-1-99-116703-3

  ISBN (paperback print on demand): 978-1-99-116704-0

  Squirrel & Swan Suspicious Things is a work of fiction. Names, places and incidents, except those clearly in the public domain, are products of the author’s imagination, or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, names, places or incidents is purely coincidental. 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.

  Contents

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  40

  Dear Reader / Acknowledgements

  1

  Donald Perry Dash, known to his friends as Don (or more recently, The Donster), opened painfully gritty eyes. He became immediately aware of not only a throbbing headache, but a smell he suspected was coming from his own person. His stomach contracted unpleasantly but he forced away the sensation.

  He blinked as his eyes came into focus, taking in his immediate surrounds: his Lexus. Why on earth had he woken up in his car? He inhaled a deep, rallying breath but immediately regretted sucking in so much of his own stale air. Squinting into the darkness beyond the car, a wave of relief rushed through his body. He was in his own garage. But what had happened last night?

  He’d had dinner with Bruce, Stanley and Russell, after which they’d gone on for more drinks at the kind of place gentlemen of his ilk liked to go. But surely he’d taken a taxi home? He frowned. Yes, because he hadn’t driven to work yesterday. So what was he doing sitting in his car now? He looked down as if there might be a clue on his body. In fact, there was. A dribble of something crusty on his shoulder. He aimed a sniff in its direction then recoiled. Yes, vomit. What this situation needed was some fresh air. He opened the car door and pushed it with his leg until it swung wide, then groaned. He ran a hand across his temple. He could summon a vague recollection of getting home but… then what? And he still couldn’t fathom why he was in his car. He looked around. The keys were in the ignition. God, he hadn’t been planning to drive somewhere had he? He shook his head, immediately wincing at the motion.

  He fumbled in his pocket. Another ping of relief at the smooth metal oblong of his phone. He pulled it out to stare at the display for a moment—did he want to know what happened last night? Maybe it was better to leave sleeping dogs lie, so to speak. But then he sighed and scrolled down to Bruce’s name. Better to play it safe. Forewarned is forearmed.

  “How’s the head?” Bruce answered the call. “Feeling a bit dusty myself.”

  “Ha-ha, yeah. End of the night’s a bit fuzzy?” He hoped Bruce would take the hint and he did.

  “Don’t worry. No dramas.”

  “I guess I got into a cab?”

  “Yeah?” Bruce’s confusion at the question was audible.

  “Like I said, a bit fuzzy.”

  Don frowned and massaged his right temple. He had to dial back these big sessions. Sixty was too old to be waking up with no memory of the end of the night. But that hadn’t happened in years. Decades. Was Bruce somehow messing with him? It certainly was within the realm of possibility. Bruce had a nasty streak, for sure.

  “I guess when you gotta go, you gotta go,” Don added breezily.

  Speaking of which, his bladder was beginning to complain.

  “Talk to you later,” he added before disconnecting.

  Feeling like he was full of poison and a million years old, Don heaved himself out of the car. He staggered a little, then hit the garage door opener. He blinked a couple of times, his eyes adjusting to the harsh morning light. There was a space where Natasha’s car usually sat. She’d already left. A flicker of hope ignited. Maybe his wife had no clue he’d had a stinker of a night and then passed out in his car. He’d on occasion slept in the spare room downstairs after coming home late. So as not to disturb her. Because he was a thoughtful husband. Yes, it was entirely possible. And with that, Don securely and irreversibly latched onto this kernel of unfounded optimism and went about addressing his hangover and getting on with his day.

  DS Roman Leconte took a seat in front of his home computer. After a rallying breath he opened his email account to check for the message he’d been waiting for. Immediately his shoulders dropped. Five new emails but not the one he wanted. The results had not yet come in. Was he relieved or frustrated? Both. This limbo was a kind of torture, but what if he got an answer that made life even more complicated?

  He picked up his phone, trying to ignore the panicky buzz in his ears. He wanted to message Sophie. He should message her. Leo had told him they were back from their holiday. So why not? With another surge of nerves, he opened the messaging app and typed out, then deleted, then retyped a brief message.

  Hi. Welcome back. Hope you had a good trip.

  He eyed the message. Was the tone right? Was it enough? Was it too much?

  “Damn,” he growled. He felt like a teenager, reaching out to the girl he liked, riding that agonising wave of hope and uncertainty. He set his shoulders, clenched his jaw, and pressed send. There. It had gone through. He watched the display for a moment. It had been delivered but Sophie didn’t appear to be online. He turned his phone face down as if this might shield him from whatever came next. Or dampen any future emotional blows. After ten minutes he checked again. It was still ‘unread’. Was she in the middle of something or had she seen his name pop up and decided not to open the message. Had she had enough of him and his definitely-over-the-weight-limit baggage?

  He dropped his phone to the desk and leaned back in his chair. He reached both hands up, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes. They couldn’t be finished before they’d even started, could they? But he couldn’t blame her. She’d been through the ringer over the past few months. She’d taken the painful step of telling him about Anya’s affair, and he’d said he needed to think and then walked away. It had been the right thing to do, given Anya’s pregnancy, but it can’t have been fun for Sophie. It wasn’t at all fun for him. None of the past few weeks had been.

  And was he even ready for Sophie? Part of him pulsed yes with a raw urgency, worried he might miss out. But another part was still reeling, recoiling in pain. He and Anya had been drifting apart for years, but the dissolution of a marriage was no small thing. And to find out Anya had not only been unfaithful but she was pregnant with another man’s child. Maybe. Just as he’d started to get used to the idea of being a father.

  In front of him his computer pinged with an email notification. His eyes immediately latched onto the message, his brain jumping to the unlikely scenario of Sophie deciding to email him using his work address instead of replying to his message. Of course she hadn’t. But, he sat up straighter, this email was related to Sophie, if only indirectly. It was about Terry Garnet’s death.

  He and Sophie had first connected while looking into the possibly suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of Paige’s father. It was a closed, cold case—ruled accidental—but Roman had questions and Sophie had agreed to help. But then life had gotten complicated. Still, he’d kept his off-the-books investigation ticking away, following up minor leads and double-checking reports here and there.

  Now, someone from the Te Awamutu Police Station had finally replied to his question. Yes, retired Detective Sergeant Connolly lived in the area. He wasn’t online but could be found at the pub at five o’clock every day, rain or shine, regular as clockwork.

  Roman smiled and wrote down the name of the pub and the contact details of the officer who’d provided this information. He sent back a quick thank you and then closed his email. DS Connolly had led the (brief) investigation into Terry Garnet’s death. If anyone could provide insight into the case, it was him.

  And Roman also had Terry’s colleague to talk to. They’d been playing phone tag—both obviously busy with more pressing (active) cases—but Roman would continue to try to set something up. Speaking of which, he picked up his phone, scrolled to the number and listened to it ring.

  “Laurie Jefferies,” the man answered.

  “Yes, DS Leconte, here. I contacted you a while back about the Terry Garnet cold case.”

  “Yes, I remember. What’s up?”

  “Can we meet?”

  “About Terry?”

  “Listen, I know it’s a cold case but, uh, his daughter needs some closure.”

  “His daughter. Paige, right?”

  “You know the family?”

  “Spent one Christmas with them when I was going through my divorce.”

  At this, something unpleasant lurched in Roman’s stomach but he pushed it away.

  “Why is she looking now? Why wait five years?” Laurie continued.

  “Not sure.” Roman felt a little bad he was using Paige’s name like this but he didn’t want to give the impression the case had been reopened officially by the police. All sorts of trouble could come with that. Reopening cases unnecessarily was generally frowned upon.

  “I guess she’s curious,” he said. “She’s interested in the cases he was working on around the time of his death.”

  “Because…?”

  “Because,” Roman took a breath, “maybe he didn’t drown accidentally.”

  “Shit, really?”

  “Look, I think she just needs to run through her own pseudo-investigation, if you know what I mean. Just so she can move on.”

  “Right.”

  Laurie sounded unconvinced but Roman pressed on. “Can we meet in the next couple of days?”

  “Sure. I can spare half an hour tomorrow if you can stand to watch me eat lunch at my desk.”

  Roman chuckled. “I understand. I’ll come to your office at say, one?”

  “See you then.”

  Roman disconnected and checked his messages again.

  No reply from Sophie. He sighed.

  2

  Inside the meeting-slash-conference room at S & S Investigations, Paige, Sophie, and Leo took their coffees to their seats, ready to commence the Current Clients Catchup meeting Paige had scheduled. After a two-week holiday, Paige and Sophie were back on deck and Leo, who’d been holding the fort while they were away, had been asked to give them an update.

  “Care to explain yourself?” Paige said, pointing to Leo’s face.

  She’d only managed to hold her tongue and reserve comment until now because she felt the situation on Leo’s face was worthy of being properly addressed once they were seated. It almost needed its own item on the meeting agenda.

  “Huh?” Leo paused with his coffee cup halfway to his mouth.

  “The thing on your face,” Paige said.

  “Your moustache,” Sophie added, for clarity.

  In the time that Paige and Sophie had been away, Leo had, rather inexplicably, grown a moustache.

  “Oh.” He returned his cup to the table and lifted his hand to stroke the edge of his newly acquired facial hair. A hint of colour climbed his cheeks. “What do you think?”

  Sophie and Paige exchanged a look.

  “Um—” Sophie began.

  “You look like a weirdo,” Paige interrupted. “Why did you do it?”

  “Ah. Just because. Why not?” Leo made a face. “You don’t like it? You think I look weird?”

  “Yes.” Paige nodded firmly. “And I’m not sure I want you facing clients with that thing.”

  “Come on, Paige,” Sophie said. “It doesn’t look that bad.”

  “Is this some sort of cry for help?” Paige continued.

  “Paige, stop it. You’re going to give him a complex.”

  Leo turned stricken eyes from Paige to Sophie. “If we’re deciding between it making me look like a weirdo and being not-that bad, I think I have my answer.”

  “If you like it, you should keep it,” Sophie said kindly.

  Leo raised an uncertain hand to his face.

  “Okay, whatever. Let’s move onto the update,” Paige said.

  While Paige and Sophie were away, S & S Investigations had had two walk-in clients. Both of which Leo and Zelda had dealt with.

  “You used the client engagement and invoice templates I sent you?” Paige asked.

  Leo nodded.

  “And they paid the fee?”

  “It’s all in the file.” He gave them a pleased smile as he pushed it over. Paige, who’d come in during the weekend and had already been through it (thus rendering these questions a touch pointless), redirected the file towards Sophie.

  “But you know all this,” Leo added to Paige. “We spoke on the phone most days you were gone.”

  “I know,” Paige replied. “Just recapping.”

  Sophie shot a look at Paige, who looked away.

  During their holiday, while Sophie had enjoyed relaxed mornings and—where possible—afternoons with her book, Paige had kept one eye pretty much constantly on what was happening at S & S Investigations. For Paige, it hadn’t been so much a vacation as a stint of working shorter hours from a different location. But Paige was not naturally inclined towards any sort of relaxation, so this had been her version of a holiday.

  “Zelda seems to be working out well?” Sophie said to Leo.

  A smile immediately appeared on his face. “Yeah, great. She’s great.” He went to say something else but then seemed to catch himself and instead looked down to play with his pen.

  “I’ve just asked her to do a few background check requests that came through from a client this morning,” Paige said.

  Zelda Ko, after quite successfully inserting herself into the S & S Investigations team with a casual work contract, had ended up being a very useful associate. And while Paige couldn’t help but acknowledge that Zelda was a very promising young investigator, she felt her to be rather irksome as a person. She refused to accept that the reason for this was their similarities in personality—as Sophie had explained more than once—and preferred to just grizzle about it when given the chance.

  “And in terms of the financials, all our clients are up to date with their invoices, so we don’t need to put the hard word on anyone,” Paige said.

  “Yeah, I checked the account and our finances are looking very good. But has anything happened with that SOS Agency recently?” Sophie asked.

  Paige shook her head. “They still haven’t replied to any of my messages.”

  “I mean, I’m not surprised, they’re our competitors after all. They’re probably not interested in engaging in discussions with us.”

  It was a few months ago now that Paige and Sophie had first been made aware of the presence of the SOS Agency, a rival investigations outfit in Auckland. After Paige and Sophie had solved the murder of Scott Radsworth during the Murder At The Reunion case, the SOS Agency had somehow been given credit for their work. The reporter who’d (erroneously) written the credit-shifting story, one Andrew Finch, would not reply to their request to explain himself. And despite repeated emails and phone calls, neither would the agency itself.

  And that they had such a catchy name and tagline—SOS Agency: We Sort Out Solutions—bothered Paige no end.

  “But maybe there’s more to it,” Paige mused.

  “Do we even care? We’re doing well with our client list, and thanks to Zelda’s article and regular tweeting and posting, our exposure is pretty good now,” Sophie said.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Leo said. “What if we use Zelda as a spy to get the inside info on the SOS Agency.”

  “Ooh.” Paige sat up. “We could send her to them pretending to be a potential client, and then she can report back.”

  Sophie nodded. “Not a bad idea, really.”

  “Because even if we’re doing well, there’s something underhand about their whole operation.” Paige screwed up her nose. “I can just smell it.”

  Professor Richard Thinton eyed the two men sitting in front of him. One was classically handsome—anyone could see—tall, with rather piercing eyes, a well-defined jawline, and a dash of the debonair about him. He looked like he could be a spy. A James Bond type, but old-school—Sean Connery. And it was this man’s good looks and air of mastery and intrigue that had given Richard the idea to set up a rival detective agency in the first place.

  Richard’s gaze shifted to the man’s colleague, who hadn’t been graced with the same genetic brush. He had somewhat bulbous eyes that seemed to both stare and skitter at the same time and he wore an ill-fitting, rumpled shirt that possibly had an egg stain on the collar. Richard had the sneaking suspicion he’d let off not one but two rather noxious farts during the fairly brief time they’d been in his office.

  “Now, Michael,” Richard began.

 

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