The woman in the sage cropped jacket and matching flared jumpsuit looked like she had been whacked from behind by one of Novak Djokovic’s killer aces and fallen flat on her face, except there was an ugly black hole in her jacket that spoke of something far less sporting. Beneath her was a thick pool of blood and beside that, a blood-spattered mobile phone in a black Givenchy Paris case.
Alicia and Lynette raced around the net and then stopped abruptly, careful to keep their distance as they stared down at her, horrified.
“What’s going on?” Perry called from the pavilion. “Is that—?”
“Greta!” roared Seamus, pushing past him and out.
He got across the court in three bounds, then leapt over the net and landed close to the woman’s shiny stilettoes, reaching down to grab her but Alicia and Lynette held him back.
“You can’t touch the body,” Alicia told him. “You’ll compromise the evidence.”
“This isn’t just any body. This is Greta! She could still be okay.”
Not with that ugly hole in her back, Alicia thought, as she wrestled to keep him away.
“Someone check her pulse,” called Perry as he rushed up, and Lynette agreed to do it, releasing Seamus so she could carefully squat beside the body.
Avoiding the blood, she took hold of Greta’s wrist and waited a few beats, but it was cold and void of life. She glanced back at Seamus and said, “I am so sorry.”
He gasped and fell onto his backside while Alicia swapped a stunned look with Perry, who had a hand to his mouth, fingers trembling.
This was not their first corpse, but it never got any easier, and all of them felt the familiar spike of adrenaline as their breath quickened and their legs hollowed out.
“What… what’s happened to her?” Seamus managed, his eyes fat with tears, his cheeks a mottled red. “I don’t understand.”
“Looks like she’s been hit in the back,” said Alicia gently.
He squinted across at her. “Hit?”
“Maybe shot? I’m not sure, sorry.”
He was shaking his head. “Shot? Like with a gun? That’s insane.”
Okay, he had that right. It was insane. This whole thing was surreal. Could it really be happening? At Ronnie’s birthday party?
“Was it an accident or…?” He glanced around, then back. “But who would want to…?” Then he noticed the iPhone. “That’s Sebastian’s.” He jumped to his feet and turned full circle, looking this way and that. “Seb!” he called out, his tone anguished. “You there, bruz?”
His cries were met with nothing but eerie silence.
The court lights were now blazing, and they could see what appeared to be more blood drops, scattered like a trail of breadcrumbs across the court and off into the surrounding bushes. And that’s when it occurred to them.
“The killer could still be here,” whispered Lynette. “We should call the cops.”
“Oh thanks for that,” Alicia hissed back, like her imagination needed any more encouragement.
“Bloody hope he is,” Seamus suddenly roared. “I’ll kill him!”
Then he threw himself up and across the court, calling out his brother’s name as he smashed his way through the lily pilly and into the dark forest beyond. The others stood there, watching, waiting for several minutes, then Alicia grappled for her phone.
“I’m calling Jackson.”
“What for?” said Lynette. “Your detective boyfriend is miles away. We need the local squad.”
Alicia groaned. Held her phone high. “There’s no signal! Shit!”
“Don’t panic, Alicia,” said Perry. “I’ll run down and get the security guard. That seccy’s name was Pete, wasn’t it? He’s trained to deal with psychopaths.”
“Hardly,” countered Lynette. “He’s a home seccy. Probably hasn’t dealt with anything more dramatic than a feral fox.”
“Well, we can’t just stand here, waiting to be shot, can we?” he spat back.
And now they were darting wary glances around the court again and Alicia was envisioning a sniper, lurking in the bushes, ready to pop them off, one by one…
“This is ridiculous,” snapped Perry. “I’m heading down.”
“Hang on.” Lynette grabbed his arm. “What’s that noise?”
They heard a soft drone that got rapidly louder as two lights twinkled through the trees, clearly coming from the driveway. The lights vanished for a few minutes, and then a golf buggy appeared, whooshing towards the pavilion. There were two men seated in the front. One was the security guard, Pete. The other was Seamus, looking shell-shocked.
Alicia felt herself relax a little as the buggy came to a stop. Sure, the seccy was well past his prime, but there was something comforting about a man in uniform.
“Saw the commotion on the cameras!” Pete called out as he made his way across the court towards them, flinging a thumb backwards. “Found this one halfway down the drive, not making a lot of sense.”
Seamus was now hunched over himself in the buggy, his face deathly pale.
“Did you see anyone out there?” Alicia called to him, but he didn’t respond.
Pete stepped closer, his expression still one of curiosity. “So what’s all this about?” Then, eyes finally locking onto the body, he exhaled and said, “Oh no. Oh shit. Okay, this isn’t good.”
“You don’t say,” said Perry, drolly.
The guard made his way around the net, then carefully knelt beside the woman. He placed two fingers on her carotid artery then exhaled again.
As he confirmed her death for himself, the others watched on, sadly, mutely. And Alicia, for one, was impressed. He might not be used to psychopaths, but at least Pete was cool in a crisis and knew how to respect a crime scene; that wasn’t always the case, even with trained officers. Or so her boyfriend, Detective Inspector Liam Jackson, often lamented.
“Anyone else hurt?” Pete asked, now back on his feet. They shook their heads. “What about at the house? Everything okay down there?”
“As far as we know,” said Alicia, but now she was peeling her ears again, waiting for a volley of gunfire as the madman slaughtered the birthday guests.
All she could hear was the low thud of the band’s double base and her own shallow breathing.
“Sebastian’s still missing,” cried Seamus, coming back to life as he leapt from the buggy and raced across the court. “And look.” He pointed to the blood trail leading towards the forest. “I think he ran that way, but I couldn’t find him.”
Pete stepped carefully across and leant down to inspect the blood. Then he turned back, his expression grim. “Did they have a fight maybe? Your brother and this young lady?”
“What?” Seamus looked confused again.
“I’m just saying. I wonder why he’s taken off.”
“You think Sebastian did this?” Seamus was gobsmacked, but Alicia’s mind was churning again.
The seccy made a valid point. Two people had gone missing, but only one had shown up. Dead. Was that Sebastian’s blood on that trail? Or did it belong to Greta? And where did all this leave the missing twin?
“My brother wouldn’t hurt a fly!” Seamus railed, but Pete was unfazed.
“Just trying to understand what’s going on here, sir.”
“I’ll tell you what’s going on here, Pete. My girlfriend’s been shot by some lunatic, and my brother is out there somewhere, bleeding and running for his life. We need to split up! We need to find him!”
“We need to call the police,” said Alicia, growling at her useless mobile.
Pete shook his head. “Reception’s hit and miss here. I’ll return to the gate and call for backup. You guys need to get to the house, let the family know what’s going on. You’ll be safer there.”
“But we can’t just leave Greta,” wailed Seamus, and Alicia realised he was right.
“That’s true. Someone should guard the body.”
“She is not a body!” cried Seamus again.
Alicia swapped a concerned look with Perry and Lynette. The man was becoming hysterical, might even go into shock. They needed to get him out of there and fast.
“I have an idea,” said Lynette. “Alicia, why don’t you head back with Seamus and alert the house. Pete can go down and call the cops, and Perry and I can stay here together until they arrive.”
The guard looked uncertain. “Not sure that’s a good idea, miss. There may still be an active shooter in the vicinity.”
“It’s fine, Pete,” said Perry. “We’re not as timid as we look. Besides, this is not our first rodeo.”
The guard still looked sceptical, as did Alicia. She didn’t like the idea of anyone remaining out here with… What did Pete call it? An active shooter? She shuddered.
“How about this then,” said Pete, eyes locked on Lynette and Perry. “You two secure yourselves in the pavilion till I give the all-clear. All doors locks from the inside, and you can keep an eye on the victim through the sliding doors. They’re thick, made of safety glass, to avoid being smashed by tennis balls.”
“Are you going to be safe at the guardhouse on your own?” asked Perry. “I’m sorry, I know you’re trained and all, but there’s a lunatic on the loose.”
“Appreciate your concern, sir, but the guardhouse is also a stronghold. Might look old but it’s built with heavy-duty galvanised steel, safety glass too. No one’s getting through those walls and nobody—I repeat‚ nobody—is getting past me.”
~
Back at the house, Claire and Missy stood at the top corner bedroom window, feeling helpless as they watched the whole ordeal from afar.
“That has to be the missing girlfriend,” said Queenie, who had also been alerted and now made up the trio.
“Unless Sebastian’s a cross-dresser,” said Missy. Because they could make out what looked like a long green frock on the prone body, even from this distance.
Missy was trying to lighten the mood, but it did not work. At least, not for Queenie, who found Missy’s silliness grating at best. It seemed logical that the two women would become close—they were both in their late twenties, both Agatha Christie aficionados—but Queenie was struggling to warm to Missy. Her humour was so juvenile, her inane rambling a nuisance, but after Claire’s sharp look earlier, Queenie knew to keep that to herself.
“Do you think she’s really hurt?” Missy added, and now Queenie couldn’t help frowning.
Missy was the queen of obvious statements too, and that drove Queenie batty. If there was one attribute you needed as an executive assistant, it was the ability to be almost invisible, hovering silently in the background. Omnipresent but never obvious. You certainly didn’t say every single thing that popped into your head. She wasn’t sure how the others tolerated Missy.
Luckily, Claire was answering for her and much more diplomatically.
“She’s more than hurt, I’d say, Missy. The poor woman hasn’t budged in ten minutes. At the very least she’s unconscious.”
“Oh dear.” Missy gulped between them. “Should we call an ambulance?”
“I expect they’ve already done that,” said Claire. “Isn’t that the security guard with them? It’s hard to see from here.”
They watched for a few minutes more, then Missy said, “I can’t just stand here like a third nostril. We need to get over there. We need to help.”
“Look,” said Claire, “Alicia and Seamus are heading back. Let’s meet them halfway and see what’s going on.”
Then they all shivered this time even though the window was now firmly closed.
~
As they trod the winding path back to the house, Seamus was singing a very different tune to the one he’d sung on the walk down.
“There’s no way Sebastian would ever hurt Greta,” he declared between pants. “He’s a good man, my brother, and he loved Greta so much.”
Ah, but did he love her too much? Alicia wondered. She cleared her throat. “You did say he was flirting with her earlier…”
He swung back. “So?”
She held up two palms. “I know he’s your brother, but you said yourself that she wouldn’t go back to him. What if he wouldn’t take no for an answer?”
“So he shot her in the back? Do you know how crazy that sounds? He doesn’t even own a gun. Neither of us do!”
“Does he know how to fire one?”
Seamus went to say something and stopped. Frowned. “Not really,” he muttered, then continued walking.
That didn’t sound like a no to Alicia, but she let it drop.
Seamus was now rambling: “Seb hasn’t got a violent bone in his body. He wouldn’t do that. He wouldn’t. He was cool with the break-up. He was. There’s no way he hurt her. No way in hell.”
But Alicia had a feeling it wasn’t her he was now trying to convince.
They were almost at the main house when Queenie, Claire and Missy appeared on the pathway, the latter looking shook-up, like she was the one who’d just seen a corpse. And it turns out she had.
“We were dumping our stuff upstairs and could see everything from the guest room,” Missy explained. “Please tell us that woman is okay. Please, please, please.”
Alicia glanced at Seamus, then said, “Sorry. She’s been fatally shot.”
“Oh no,” Missy gasped as the other two nodded slowly, as if they had already drawn that conclusion.
Seamus swept past them. “I’m going to find Aunty Ronnie.”
“Hang on.” Alicia grabbed hold of his elbow. “Let us tell Ronnie. You’re far too upset.”
“She’s my aunty. I have to tell her!” He shook himself free and forged on.
Alicia groaned, then glanced down at her phone, noticing that it now had a few bars. She felt a sliver of hope.
“Listen, guys,” she told the others, “I really want to call Jackson. Can you follow Seamus back? He’s in a bad way. Try to steer him into the house if you can, away from the party. Maybe take him into the study, get him a warm blanket and a stiff drink. And can someone find Ronnie and lure her in there too, so he can at least break the news to her in private?”
Claire nodded. “I’ll look for Ronnie.”
“We’ll keep Seamus contained,” said Queenie, “and meet you all back in the study.”
Then they ran after him while Alicia scrolled for her boyfriend’s name and pressed Dial.