Another Bloody Love Story Read online

  Another Bloody Love Story

  By

  Rachel Green

  Eternal Press

  A division of Damnation Books, LLC.

  P.O. Box 3931

  Santa Rosa, CA 95402-9998

  www.eternalpress.biz

  Another Bloody Love Story

  by Rachel Green

  Digital ISBN: 978-1-61572-455-0

  Print ISBN: 978-1-61572-456-7

  Cover art by: Amanda Kelsey

  Edited by: Pam Slade

  Copyedited by: Barbara Legge

  Copyright 2011 Rachel Green

  Printed in the United States of America

  Worldwide Electronic & Digital Rights

  1st North American, Australian and UK Print Rights

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any form, including digital and electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the Publisher, except for brief quotes for use in reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Characters, names, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For DK and Lu,

  who put up with living with a writer.

  Chapter One

  Sister Mary stood in the shadowed porch of the convent, her eyes screwed tight against the bright sunlight of the outside world. She waited for a moment longer than necessary for her eyes to adjust but the shove to her back, intended to send her stumbling past the threshold, did nothing to rock her stance. She glanced behind her, shrugging a crease from clothes that radiated her failure in the service of God. She had suffered a paperless divorce, from a husband that spoke only from the pages of a thousand year old book.

  “Will you go on already? I’ve things to do.” Sister Constance had not lost the lilt of her Irish heritage in almost forty years of devotion. The thin set of her mouth grew tight; a line of malice in the moon under the wimple.

  The former Sister Mary looked over her shoulder at her tormentor and raised an eyebrow. “Screw you, you old harridan,” she said, taking a pair of sunglasses from her jacket pocket and slipping them on.

  She pushed them up the bridge of her nose with a forefinger, turned and promptly fell down the step.

  Chapter Two

  Charlton Heston Spencer, named for his mother’s infatuation with the actor, reacted to the knock on the door by opening his desk drawer and sweeping the paperwork into it. He pulled across a document detailing the increasing occurrence of scabies in battery hens and said, “Come in.”

  His office door clicked open to reveal the latest addition to his staff, Pennie Black. She had changed her name by deed poll when she’d divorced her husband, after catching him with an elf at the New Year Grand Ball. His assertion of it being a case of mistaken identity failed to convince, especially since they had arrived together as Mister and Mrs. John Parrot, pirates of the Channel Tunnel. Charlton had heard the story, in agonizing detail, over lunch the previous day.

  “Charlton?” Pennie smiled, showing the gap in her teeth where an extra tooth had been removed as a teenager. “I’ve finished mucking out the small animals. What do you want me to do next?”

  “Chase, please. Call me Chase. Only my mother calls me Charlton.” He stood to look at the staff schedule. “Debbie’s off today. Would you muck out Kermit?”

  Pennie’s smile faded. Kermit was a three-hundred pound Gloucestershire Old Spot, a pig well known for its cantankerous behavior. Yesterday it had eaten one of her Wellingtons, forcing her to spend the rest of the day wearing sandals and buy another pair on the way home. Chase looked at her, his eyebrows raised.

  “Of course,” she stammered. “I’d love to.”

  “Excellent.” Chase sat again and gave her a smile. “I like to see enthusiastic staff.”

  “I’ll see you for lunch, shall I?” Pennie hovered at the door, one hand on the knob.

  “I can’t today. I’ve got a meeting with my accountant.”

  “Oh.” Her smile faded. “I’ll er…I’ll see you later then, Chase.”

  “I expect so.” Chase kept up the smile until the door closed with a disconsolate click, then slumped into his chair. He flicked through Veterinary Today without really noticing the words.

  He straightened again at the second knock, but his business-suited accountant, briefcase in hand, didn’t wait for the invitation to enter.

  “What have you said to that girl?” he asked. “She looks as dour as your mother’s arse.”

  Chase frowned. “I’d rather you didn’t make references to my mother. “That was Pennie, the new girl. I think she has a crush on me.”

  “Lucky you,” said the accountant. He put his briefcase on the desk and opened it, glancing around at the décor while he edged paperwork onto the smooth walnut of the desk. As offices went, he’d seen worse, though the labelled diagrams of what went on inside a dog would not be his first choice of poster. “Or not so lucky. You’re in shit, old son.”

  “Still?” Chase didn’t seem surprised. “How deep?”

  “As deep as a well full of shit under a sewage plant. Sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings and all, but there it is.” He dropped the papers in front of Chase, who pushed them away.

  “I don’t want to know, Mister Jasfoup,” he said. “Am I going to lose my house?”

  “Your house, your car, your stereo and your appendix.” Jasfoup grinned and tapped an elegant finger on one of the letters. “That one’s from your doctor. It’s likely to rupture in the next six weeks.” He leafed through the rest of the papers. “Your credit cards have been cancelled, your car will be repossessed next week, you’re six months in arrears on your mortgage and you’ll have to switch to pay-as-you-go on your mobile.” He gestured to the room and by extension, the building around them. “It’s lucky this place is recognized as a charity or you’d lose the business as well. If you don’t come up with an influx of cash soon, you’re going to be in court.”

  “Could I declare bankruptcy?”

  “Not if you want to stay out of prison. If you do that they’ll audit this place and find you’ve been fiddling the books. Besides, bankruptcy won’t solve the little problem of Big Michael.”

  “Don’t remind me. He wants five hundred by Friday.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” Jasfoup helped himself to a mug of coffee from the filter machine. “I told you not to borrow from a loan shark.”

  “I thought I could pay it back.” Chase sat up and leaned his elbows on the desk. “How was I to know Customs would seize the whole shipment? It was marked Veterinary Supplies on the crate.”

  “There’s no telling them you were importing Bison semen for legitimate research,” said Jasfoup. “Not in those quantities.”

  “But my method works.” Chase pulled his notes from the shelf and waved them at Jasfoup. “Combining the DNA from domestic stock with African bison will produce cattle that are twice as productive in terms of milk production and eventual meat yield, with the added benefit of increasing their resistance to foot and mouth and bovine spongiform encephalopathy.”

  “Mad cow disease.” Jasfoup nodded thoughtfully and put his coffee on the desk to add UHT cream. “It’s a fantastic idea,” he said, “and your clinical trials seem to be a success.” He glanced out of the window to where Chase’s small herd of bicow were grazing in the field outside. “Neverth
eless it’s a long term investment. You’re looking at five years before you can get any sort of recognition for it. You need money a lot more quickly than that.”

  Chase held out his hands. “What can I do?”

  “You’ll have to use your natural resources.” Jasfoup gathered the papers together. “You don’t have a bean, old son. Don’t you know any rich widows who suffer from a heart condition?”

  “Not a one.”

  “Gullible divorcees, then?”

  “No such luck.” Chase’s voice trailed off. “Wait a minute.” He pulled open his drawer and shuffled past the bills to the staff files. “Pennie said she was divorced.”

  “The one making mad cow eyes at you just now?” Jasfoup smiled and held out his hand. “Let me have a look.”

  Chase handed the file over and Jasfoup worked through it, noting Pennie’s personal details down in his diary. He put it down and looked at his client. “She hasn’t worked in five years,” he said. “What made you take her on as a lab assistant?”

  “She’s not, she’s an animal technician, according to the reports I submitted.” Chase put the file away. “She made several donations to the shelter when she was married. It seemed churlish to turn her away when she applied for the job. It’s not as if she wasn’t qualified.”

  “Post graduate degree in animal husbandry? Over qualified, I’d say. Most of your staff haven’t got two GCSEs to rub together.”

  “I wanted someone who could look after the place while I’m away,” Chase said.

  “If you don’t get your hands on some money that could be for a very long time.” Jasfoup drained his coffee and put the mug back down on the exact ring it had left in the walnut surface.

  “Very droll.” Chase opened the draw to put the file away and pulled out the discarded papers instead. “Got any tips for the two-thirty at Kempton?”

  “Don’t bet on it.” Jasfoup stood. “Not that I expect you to listen. If you’d taken any of my advice you wouldn’t be in the mess you’re in. I’ll have a look at this young lady when I get back to the office and give you a call, okay?”

  “Thanks.” Chase was bent over the betting slip. “You’d think after three years of betting I’d have started picking winners by now. Every single horse I put money on loses. The law of averages says that I should have won something, even if it’s only a tenner.”

  “You’re in no position to quote laws, Chase.” Jasfoup opened the door. “Maybe you’re just the unluckiest person in England. Have you ever considered that?”

  “Every day of my life.” Chase watched the accountant give a cheerful wave as he left, then looked out of the window. If he leaned to one side he could see Penny clearing out the pig sty. It looked as if she was playing tug-o-war with Kermit, using a green Wellington boot as the rope.

  “Are you the one who’s going to get me out of this mess?” he asked aloud. “No harm in a little flirting, just in case.”

  He swept the betting slip up as he rose and tucked it into his wallet. There should be enough time before lunch to pop it down to the bookies on the high street. On his way to the car he stopped by Kermit’s sty.

  “Having a bit of trouble, Pennie?”

  She looked at him gratefully. Her previously spotless jumper and jeans were now a single streak of pig manure from toes to neck and it didn’t stop there. It was clear the Wellington she and the pig were fighting over was her own.

  “I wouldn’t mind so much,” she said, “but he ate one of my wellies yesterday.”

  “The same one?” Chase asked.

  “No, a different one. I bought a new pair last night. Kermit used my divided attention to his advantage and pulled me over. A face full of liquid pig swill does wonders to narrow the mind and I let go. I sat up and watched the pig stride triumphantly into his pen.”

  “I meant, was it the same boot, left or right? Otherwise you’d still have a whole pair between them.”

  “No. He only goes for the left.” Pennie looked down at her foot, where thick pig sludge was oozing between her toes. Like all Wellingtons, this one had claimed her sock as well.

  Chase held the gate open for her. “Give it up for now,” he said. “Have the rest of the day off and go home. I think you deserve it.”

  Pennie stumbled through the gate, her one boot, one bare foot walk unbalanced her. Chase helped her up, taking the arm that had spent the least amount of time in manure, “I’ve got to pop into town,” he said. “Can I give you a lift home?”

  “No, I’ve got my car,” said Pennie. “If I let you take me home, tempting though that is, I won’t be able to get back again in the morning.”

  “Good point.” Chase dug a tissue out of his pocket and wiped her face with it. “There you are!” he said, as if she’d been invisible and he’d wiped away the vanishing cream. “I’ll see if I can find you some more wellies tomorrow.” He began to walk away, stopped and turned back. “And we’ll have lunch.”

  Chapter Three

  Valerie Quarter smiled at the gentleman in the leather jacket as she walked towards him. Obviously attracted, he smiled back, turning his head to keep her in view. Although the pallor of her skin was something she needed to work on, she knew she had a good figure and he obviously thought so too. So much so that he walked straight into the bench set up by the council for teenagers to have somewhere to intimidate the shoppers from. She passed him with a smile and lifted his wallet while he rubbed his knee and cursed.

  By the time she’d rounded the next corner she’d extracted thirty pounds, wiped off her fingerprints and deposited the wallet still with the man’s license and credit cards into a post-box. The Royal Mail was trustworthy enough to return it to him.

  The Green rooms were a pleasant way to take stock of herself. Everything seemed better with a cup of Darjeeling and a cream bun inside you. The convent had sent her away with the sum of ten pounds. If you considered that to be wages for almost a year’s life in devotion to God, it wasn’t very much. Fortunately she also had a personal Swiss bank account with half a million pounds gathering interest, proceeds from her second life, though she had no access to it without her documents.

  Valerie, the former Sister Mary, had trained first as a novice and then as a nun in the Order of the Twisted Heart, which had also been in the business of redemption. Most convents are. It’s possible to ask any convent to pray for a loved one to help them to attain the exalted state of Heaven. The difference between most convents and the Order of the Twisted Heart was the Order sent their clients Heavenward personally. A Bride of Christ made an excellent cover for an assassin.

  She stirred her tea, conscious of every person around her, the distance between them and their possible angle of attack. The young mother and the toddler might be just what she seemed, but wouldn’t be the first assassin to use a child as cover. The gentleman with the raincoat might as easily be a spy as a pensioner eating a custard tart. It paid to be careful.

  When her previous order had collapsed under the weight of discovery, Sister Valerie had been accepted into the Order of St. Magdalene of Pity under the new name of Sister Mary. Pity took a less enlightened view of her nocturnal comings and goings, leading to several disagreements with the Mother Superior which had culminated, after a year of disciplinary procedures, with this morning’s expulsion.

  Valerie sipped her tea. It wasn’t that she didn’t believe in God. On the contrary, she believed in Him wholeheartedly, and sending people to Him earlier than they would have wished, gave them more chance at redemption. It was a sign of her respect that she prayed over those she redeemed. Each one held a place in her memory and a bead on her rosary. Her fingers strayed to her belt but encountered nothing.

  Valerie looked down, horror clouding her face. Where was her rosary?

  Leaving the tea and bun she hurried back along the street retracing her steps. No lon
ger the nonchalant browser, she was the image of a flustered woman in search of something valuable. Her steps led her through the market to the bench where she’d stolen the wallet. It was the most likely place to have dropped it but searching the immediate area, including the shopping bags of the mature lady currently occupying it failed to turn up the string of beads.

  Valerie stood, ignoring the indignation of the woman, and scanned the surrounding area. She was at the very top of the market now, where banks and building societies enticed shoppers with promises of ten-minute loans and mortgages-while-you-wait. To the north was The Shambles, a series of short alleys and interlocking streets where tiny shops huddled together in the shadows.

  She headed into the thoroughfare of Dark Passage, so named because the three and four-story buildings blocked off most of the light. To her left was the bookseller, Alexandrian Gold with the Basement Gallery underneath it and to her right was a witch’s shop. Goddess Provides seemed a likely place to sell a crucifix, even if it was a shop for heathens.

  Valerie crossed the street to look in the window. Typical of such shops, it was bordered in notices printed on lurid paper with cheap ink-jet printers: Learn Meditation, Drumming and spiritual journeys seminar, tarot reading, and a psychic fair. The list went on, each promising fulfilment in this life that would doom their practitioners to Hell in their next life.

  Inside the window was a low display of occult paraphernalia. An eclectic collection of figurines and false idols vied for space with a series of Tibetan singing bowls in frosted glass and a motley group of trinkets depicting everything from pentagrams to a crucifix.

  Valerie frowned. That was her rosary. The man she had robbed had stolen it and sold it to the witch in the shop. Righteous indignation brought a flush of color to Valerie’s cheeks as she marched inside.