Blue Moon Investigations series Boxed Set 2

by steve higgs

  ‘What’s happening?’ He asked. The question was aimed at anyone that wanted to field it.

  ‘You really don’t know, Richard?’ I asked, my voice filled with mock surprise. ‘Kieron, I would really like you to put the shotgun down before I tell you what I have discovered. The police are on their way. Even if the guilty parties run, they will not get far.’

  ‘I have had enough of this nonsense.’ Lara was making determined steps toward her farmhouse.

  Even though I saw it coming, the blast from the shotgun stunned me. The quiet of the farm was split as a single barrel roared. Kieron had aimed it in the air and wasted half of his two shots. The point had been made though. Lara was frozen to the spot.

  ‘Stay. Where. You. Are. Lara.’ The words came out through clenched teeth. ‘Keep talking please, Amanda. You said guilty parties, as in plural. How many of my friends are involved?’ He moved his shotgun between Glen and Lara and then swung it toward Richard and Michelle.

  Each of them looked terrified.

  I took a step toward him. For his own good, I might need to tackle him or try to take the weapon from him before he could use it. I started talking as I began to edge nearer. ‘Do you remember that Glen’s father’s farm was confiscated?’ He nodded. ‘Well, it ended up under government control alright, but only after Glen sold it to them for millions after he found natural gas beneath it.’

  ‘That’s not true!’ Glen shouted. His reaction caused the shotgun to swing back towards him, an action that elicited his silence once more.

  ‘I have a friend that is surprisingly good at finding details, Glen. This is all quite easy to prove.’

  ‘That’s very interesting.’ Said Michelle. ‘But what does it have to do with our milk?’

  I ignored the question as I pressed on. ‘The first clue was the university photograph of the sisters.’

  ‘What sisters?’

  ‘I’m glad you asked, Kieron. Your wife is Michelle’s sister.’

  Michelle chuckled. ‘Preposterous.’

  ‘Oh, really, Michelle? A friend of mine said something yesterday that stuck with me. It didn’t mean anything at the time. Shall I tell you what she said?’ I let the question hang as I looked around at my audience.

  ‘Well, I want to know.’ Said Jack from behind me.

  Quelling an almost overwhelming urge to kick him in the trousers again, I said, ‘Sisters share everything. Except for men.'

  ‘Wonderful.’ Sniped Lara. ‘I’ll have a bumper sticker made.’

  ‘Lara, why don't you show Michelle your baby?'

  She froze at my suggestion.

  ‘What does she mean, Lara?’ Asked Michelle.

  Lara had nothing to say, but I did. It wasn't about Lara and her baby though. ‘I got caught up investigating Glen and Tamara. I found out that the substance that is making the milk glow is the same bioluminescent stuff that makes cuttlefish glow. It is used in medicine, so I figured Tamara the pharmacist had supplied it in sufficient quantities to dope the herds. But she couldn't administer it to all three farms at once so there had to be other people involved. And the herds were continuing to produce luminous milk even after she died.'

  Michelle was trying to see the baby Lara had tucked into her chest.

  ‘The milk was white again this morning wasn’t it, Kieron?’

  ‘How could you know that?’ He asked.

  ‘It was a guess actually, but one based on deductive reasoning. The university photograph I mentioned earlier had the two girls, Lara and Michelle in their graduating class at Dorchester University. Also in the picture, is Glen Adongo. He was on secondment from Southampton University at the time. Isn’t that right, Glen?’

  Glen didn’t answer, but Richard had a question. For his wife. ‘What does she mean, Michelle? Is Lara your sister?’ This confirmed something I had been wondering about.

  I carried on telling my story, ‘There is a bit here that I cannot prove. A bit that is part conjecture and part anecdote. The girls had other friends at university. The photograph helpfully named them all. When my colleague spoke to some of them this morning, they claimed that Glen was sleeping with Michelle. I imagine the two of them kept it very hush, hush though.'

  ‘Why is that?’ Asked Jack helpfully.

  Lara was looking utterly panicked now.

  ‘Because he was also sleeping with her sister, Lara.’

  ‘No!’ Screamed Michelle. ‘He’s mine, Lara. He was always mine.’

  ‘What the hell are you saying, Michelle?’ Asked Richard, his world unravelling before his eyes.

  Kieron didn’t know where to point the weapon. I moved a pace closer.

  ‘Show me that baby!’ Michelle demanded.

  ‘I don’t believe this!’ Richard was burying his face in his hands.

  Kieron said, ‘Looks like they got us both, buddy.’ He thought he had one friend left, but he was wrong about that too.

  ‘Not so fast there, Kieron.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘I’m afraid the greatest betrayal of all, might be Richard’s.’

  Richard's eyes were out on stalks. ‘But I helped you.' He pleaded.

  All too late, I thought as I pressed on once more. ‘Richard discovered, by accident I assume, that there is natural gas beneath the soil here. It doesn't really matter how he came about the information, because it was Richard that went looking for a Geologist last year. He found Glen, Glen checked it out and between them, they cooked up a plan to get your farm out from under you.'

  ‘It wasn't like that.' Richard protested. ‘I wanted to tell you, mate. You were just so set on being a farmer here and struggling along. We could have made a fortune and set up again somewhere else without all the debt and worry. It would have been so brilliant.'

  ‘I even remember you telling me something about it. About natural gas on the land.' Kieron admitted, his face still a mask of anger.

  ‘Yes, that’s right. I told you about it straight away.’

  ‘And I said I would rather die than have the beautiful countryside ripped up just to get at some gas. Fracking would have destroyed the land.' With the shotgun now pointing toward Richard because that was where Kieron was facing, Glen tried to take a step backward. ‘Don't you move.' Kieron instructed quietly. The stillness and calm in his voice scarier than the weapon at this point.

  ‘I was going to share the money with you, Kieron.’ Richard was pleading. ‘Both of us together with the girls and the babies would have flourished, free of debt and money worries at new farms.’

  I needed to interject. ‘Except you wouldn't have. Would they, Glen?’ All eyes swung to me. ‘Your wives were never yours, Richard. Both belong to another man. They seduced you on his instruction. He was going to have all the land once you were bankrupt. Maybe he even planned to fake your suicides. I can only imagine how deep this goes, but tell me, Richard, do you have a large freezer on your property anywhere?'

  He didn’t answer, but Michelle’s expression told me I had scored another hit.

  ‘It is where Glen and Michelle stashed Tamara’s body when he killed her. Why did you kill her, Glen?’

  What was keeping Patience? Where was she?

  I was taking my time, but I didn’t know how long I could string this out. ‘Was it that she found out about Michelle? Or Lara? Or both of them? Or was it something else? Did she find out that you had been using her contacts to get hold of the pills you were doping the cows with? Or was she in on it and changed her mind?'

  ‘It was an accident.’ Glen blurted, speaking for the first time in minutes.

  ‘An accident.’ I repeated. ‘You called Michelle though and shoved Tamara’s body in the freezer at Richard’s farm. Who came up with the genius idea to plant her body outside when you heard about the alien?’

  No one answered for a moment, then Lara broke the silence and finally the confession started. ‘It was her idea.’ She said, pointing to Michelle while cradling the baby with her other arm. ‘She always wanted Tamara dead.
’

  ‘Lara, what are you saying?’ Shrieked Michelle, but it sounded fake.

  ‘Tamara caught Glen kissing me and went nuts. She was in on the whole thing but had no idea either of us was sleeping with her husband. That bitch was so blind. Just like you Michelle, you wanted Glen for yourself. We could have shared him, but you always pretended you didn’t know.’

  ‘I didn’t know!’ She shouted.

  ‘Ladies, there is enough of me to go around. We can still be a happy family.’ Glen’s comment drew stares from Richard and Kieron.

  The shotgun came back around to point at Glen’s head. ‘You better start talking or I’m going to blow your head off.’ Kieron promised.

  Nervously, Glen raised his hands in surrender, but he started talking. ‘There is a huge pocket of natural gas beneath your feet. Tens of millions of pounds, maybe even more than that. We own the land, Kieron. All we have to do is agree to extract it and we are all richer than you can count.’

  ‘I don’t give a damn about the gas. Why is my wife holding your baby?’

  ‘I needed you to be distracted and to feel safe. I needed to know what you were doing. Lara and Michelle agreed to seduce and marry you both so the three of us could gain control of the land. Lara was never meant to get pregnant.’

  ‘The three of us.’ I echoed. All eyes turned to me. ‘Your plan never included Tamara, did it? Were you always going to kill her?’

  ‘I had a dead body in my freezer.’ Richard was borderline catatonic. He was burbling to himself and cradling his face.

  ‘Hold on. Hold on.’ Demanded Kieron. ‘What about the milk? You knew that my milk was back to normal this morning. How?’

  ‘Because Lara hadn’t been here to put fresh dope into their feed. Glen and Richard and Tamara and Michelle and Lara were all in this wonderful little plot together. Glen was the geologist that could test and confirm the potential size and worth of the find. Richard was the well-meaning idiot, who, by the way, did a top job of trying to help me solve the case by dressing up in a hoody and a mask and feeding me clues.’ Richard’s jaw hung slack. He clearly believed I would not work out it was him. ‘Richard got cold feet and wanted to expose the truth, so he fed me clues but tried to conceal his identity. He pointed me toward a picture of the girls at Uni, hoping I would spot Glen and make the connection. He didn’t know the girls were sisters and certainly didn’t know that his wife was never on his side.’ I made eye contact with Richard. ‘It that your baby she carries?’ His horrified face turned to stare at his wife’s belly.

  ‘Lara and Michelle are the poisonous sisters that would marry and sleep with a man just to ensure they could manipulate his actions. That’s why Lara has been pushing you to sell. Glen has money from the sale of his father’s farm. My friendly researcher had difficulty proving that bit as finances are always well hidden. He got there though. Glen would have bought the land and then done whatever he wanted. He couldn’t just do it on his own land because it would tip his hand to you. He wanted it all. That’s how the greedy mind works. It always wants more.’

  ‘The girls were doping the cows. None of the farm hands would question the farmer’s wife going into the milking shed to see the cows each morning, now would they?’

  Kieron saw the truth of it. Then his brow knitted again. ‘What about the alien Lara saw?’

  ‘Oh, that was real.’

  ‘What?’ He squeaked.

  ‘Well, it was really there. But it was this man,‘ I grabbed Jack by his shoulder, ‘inside a suit. He was taking advantage of the recent crop circles, which by the way were an art project made by Lee and Christian, the two college geeks you met, and the report of glowing milk and the lights reported in the sky.’ Beside me Jack was smiling broadly as he shook his head. ‘It was all a ruse to advance his show.’

  ‘Oh, Amanda. You could not be more wrong if you tried.’

  ‘It worked too, didn’t it, Jack? You are suddenly quite famous.’

  The blissful sound of sirens in the distance reached my ears. I was just about to tell them about the lights in the sky when the tension that had been keeping everyone in place finally broke.

  Hearing the police on their way, Glen, knowing he was guilty of murder, ran for it. Kieron reacted by swinging the shotgun to fire at Glen’s back.

  I shouted for him to stop, but I couldn’t get to him before the gun went off.

  Michelle meanwhile had crossed the yard to confront her sister. Lara was defending her baby as Michelle ranted and screamed at her. Richard didn’t move.

  But Kieron’s shot mostly missed Glen. There was a shout of pain, but Glen ducked around the side of the farm and was gone.

  ‘Nobody move.’ I commanded.

  Nobody listened though. I turned to wave to the police cars as they were sweeping into the farm. Leading the way was Patience with the terrified face of Brad Hardacre in the passenger seat.

  Officers spilled from the cars and vans to separate the sisters and to cuff Richard and Kieron. Kieron was still holding the shotgun and looking beaten.

  The sound of a quad bike preceded Glen emerging from behind a barn astride it. He shot off across the field over terrain the police vehicles were not suited to.

  They were not defeated for long though, two Land Rovers were requisitioned in seconds, Patience once again trying to get behind the wheel only to find no one was brave enough to get in with her.

  Aftermath and Aliens. Sunday, November 13th 1400hrs

  Quiet had fallen at the farm. Glen had been chased and caught. Everyone was under arrest and evidence was being gathered. Soon they would take Glen, Richard, and the girls away. Kieron was being questioned but was not in cuffs as he was considered to be the victim.

  His farm was safe, he could return to making a living, but I doubted he would ever feel the same about it again. He was sitting on top of a fortune in natural energy yet had principles that denied him the option of getting to it. Without it though, and without the other farms to support his milk producing efforts, would he even be able to stay in business?

  These were not my concerns. My concern was that I had a bill for the last few days and I had to hand it to a man that I knew to be not only broke but broken-spirited and broken-hearted as well.

  It could wait.

  I was getting hungry. Lunch simply hadn’t happened. I wandered outside to see if the police had some food going.

  I spotted Jack. He was lounging against a fence looking like he hadn't a care in the world. What on earth was he doing here anyway? Today's revelations had done nothing to further his cause. He had reported in the Supernatural Times that the milk was aliens attempting to subvert humankind. Today's revelations disproved his theories. I still hadn't confronted him about that.

  Well, I was going to do it now. Let’s see what effect that had on his smug grin.

  ‘There’s an alien spacecraft over Larson Farm!’

  All eyes turned to the voice. A farm worker was holding his mobile phone and shouting. In the quiet, we could just about make out the voice on his speaker.

  ‘Barry sent me a picture of it. It just scared the herd over by east field. Now it’s heading through the woods toward Hogget’s Hill.’

  No one moved.

  ‘He says there’s an alien as well. Soldiers are hunting it.’

  All around me, people exploded into action. Farm hands were jumping onto anything with wheels and a motor. The police that were not directly involved with sweeping up the events at Brompton farm piled into their cars.

  Next to me, as I fiddled with my bag to find my keys, Jack said, ‘Well, well. I appear to be standing here next to you. I hope you will let me help you with wardrobe when we present together. Something revealing ought to fit the bill. Nothing slutty, just enough skin to tease though.’

  I shoved him roughly out of my way as I ran to my car. The farmhands were going cross country, the roads would be faster, but where the police would need to navigate, I already knew where I was going.

&nb
sp; I had a bad feeling about the alien. If soldiers were indeed chasing it, they must be from BARF. I had a hunch BARF were not a government-sanctioned unit at all, but instead a privately funded bunch of morons. Would they be armed? I shuddered to think.

  I mashed my foot down as I came out of the farm and onto what passed for a main road in the countryside. Hogget’s farm was three miles away through twisting country lanes. I had to be the first to get there though.

  If I had the map right in my head, the alien was heading north through the woods that bordered the upper edge of Larson Farm. The woods ended at a road where the creature would have to emerge to continue onwards.

  With my car whipping along the tight roads as fast as I dared to push it and a constant prayer for tractors to stay in the field on my lips, I spied ahead of me the deep crimson and black of a BARF vehicle. As I drew nearer, I could make out the distinctive shape of a Land Rover Defender.

  I had a police car behind me in which I could see Patience and Brad Hardacre with grim faces as they tried to keep up with me. Brad was at the wheel and giving it all he had, but the mini was simply better engineered for this kind of driving. I caught the BARF truck and went directly around it, risking my life to get through a tiny gap before we hit the next corner.

  Patience and Brad got stuck behind it. That was what I needed though. I had to be the one to intercept the alien and I had to be alone.

  More corners at dangerous speeds and suddenly I was there. I hit the brake pedal and skidded to a stop, my tyres skipping across the road and leaving rubber behind.

  I spotted the alien instantly. It had already crossed the road and was running across the scrubby field to the north. The only feature ahead of it was Hogget's Hill. In the open, it was massively exposed.

  A shout brought my attention around to look the way the alien had just come. Through the woods to the south, I could see guys in uniform. The same deep crimson and black, which did little to camouflage them in the woods as they were darker than everything else. I wondered if they were armed until a shot rang out.