The Dead Speak Ill Of The Living (The Dead Speak Paranormal Mysteries Book 1) (23 page)

  
“We do,” and Dee smiled at him. All he could see were her eyes.

  
“Where exactly are we?”

  
“Old industrial estate, and by old and industry I mean they made textiles here
when we still had factories.”

  
“Going back a bit.”

  
“Yes, but people died in these old mills, conditions were horrendous.”

  
“Ah,” and Dee grinned, “so you think there’s a chance.”

  
“Oh, I do, I do.”

  
They’d soon set the equipment up, and Joe turned it on.

  
“Are you the police?” came a desperate voice.

  
“Yes,” Maquire said, do you have something to tell us?”

  
“Yes, yes, it’s terrible, really terrible.”

  
“Go on,” and he had his notebook ready.

  
“The conditions in our mills was terrible, terrible, something should have been
done.”

  
“In your mills?”

  
“Yes.”

  
“In the mills which aren’t there anymore?”

  
“The mill owners have descendants, they must do, and I’m sure my kids had…”

  
Maquire shook his head. “We are not here to sort a compensation claim over a
century late.”

  
“Oh, what are you here for?”

  
“A young man was dumped here recently, a man with no eyes.”

  
“Oh, him.”

  
“So you saw it?”

  
“Yes.”

  
“Did you see who did it?”

  
“Yes.”

  
“Right, can you describe them.”

  
“A woman, stocky, not short.”

  
“A woman?” Joe said in amazement.

  
“Yes Joe,” Dee explained “women are perfectly capable of being psychos too.”

  
“Tell me about it,” Maquire added.

  
“Can you give me a description of the face please?”

  
Soon Maquire had most of what he wanted, but the ghost could only remember the
first half of the number plate, and that the car was red. But it was a start.

  
“What will you do about the mill owners?” came the digital voice.

  
“You’ll have to start a union or something.”

  
“Of spirits?!”

  
“Don’t give them ideas,” Dee cautioned.

  
Two pairs of eyes were watching the scene from a distance, but that was where
binoculars came in handy. A woman was stood, peering round the side of a
building, and she saw Detective Maquire, who she knew was in charge of finding
her, and two other people who most definitely weren’t police officers helping.
Was that even allowed in law? And why were they stood around talking as if
there was a fourth person? It was odd, and she was convinced this detective was
losing the plot and would never be able to find her. Which was good, because
she knew prison wouldn’t be conducive to her passion for eyes.

  
But this morning had yielded something relevant to that, indeed it had revealed
a gem. Of the two people with Maquire one was a tall, thin redhead, and while
looks didn’t move the needle for the watcher, the redhead’s eyes certainly did.
They were a wonderful deep green, and she oh so wanted to have them. Yes, she
oh so did.

  
And as the watcher saw them split up, get into cars and begin to leave, so the
watcher got into hers to follow, because wanting had turned into acquiring. All
it would take was the opportunity…

  
The redhead’s car had pulled up a café in the middle of nowhere, and the pair
had gone inside, so the Watcher pulled up too and did a quick loop of the
building on foot. The café seemed almost deserted, as if someone had built it
in the wrong spot, and there was just the pair she was following inside and a
couple behind the counter serving. Interesting.

  
The watcher went inside, but didn’t order a coffee as the redhead could be
heard to say “get me a cappuccino, I need a piss,” as she disappeared down the
side and through a door marked toilets. Interesting, and the watcher followed
her, no eyes following, and soon the Watcher found herself in a small corridor,
with two doors leading into toilets, a door leading back into the building… and
a fire exit.

  
This would be a risk, a great risk, but also a great high. Smiling, the Watcher
removed a case from her pocket, and pulled out a syringe.

  
Joe was sat drinking his coffee in the almost abandoned cafe Dee liked to
frequent, and he was watching her cappuccino go cold. She’d been an awfully
long time in the toilet, which was unlike her, and he was getting a bit bored
to be honest, and looking like a man who’d been stood up. Which was bad enough
in a posh restaurant, but here was galling. He had the rucksack on the chair
next to him, and as he looked round, realised the place was empty, he reached
in and flicked the machine on. Maybe this place was haunted, maybe he could
have a chat with…

  
“Quick, quick,” came a voice.

  
“What?”

  
“Your friend, the redhead, she’s been kidnapped.”

  
“What?”

  
“A woman, got a needle in her, carried her out the exit and the car drove off!”

  
“Fucking fuck…did you get the licence plate?”

  
“Yeah, I got it.”

  
“And this just happened?”

  
“No, you’ve been sat waiting for an hour.”

  
“Fucknuts.”

  
Stride was looking at the front door to Dee’s house. Smart place, mostly
plastic so no need to paint, although the fittings looked new. Not that he was
here to criticise the decor.

  
“So the man who owns the machine is staying here?”

  
“Yeah,” Bear confirmed, “I went round to check his place out, saw this big hole
in front of it, spoke to a neighbour and found he’d moved out while the
plumbing was repaired. In here with a friend.”

  
“You say friend as if they’re shagging.”

  
“Nah, friend as in another one of the investigators.”

  
“Ah, I see. So have you got a key then?”

  
“A key?” Bear looked askance.

  
“Well we have to get in somehow.”

  
“We’re burgling the place Stride, and taking something, we want it to look as
random as possible, so we do this,” and the huge man shoulder charge the front
door, which wrenched open with a pleasing crunch.

  
“How silly of me,” Stride rolled his eyes.

  
“You check upstairs, I’ll check down. We’re looking for wherever this Joe le
Tissier is staying. I think it’s a house full of women, so look for some boxers
or something.”

  
It took two minutes to identify Joe’s room, and soon they were turning it upside
down. It took longer to realise something else.

  
“I can’t find any machine,” Stride explained, “but I’ve found plenty of
drawings of it.”

  
“Nope, me neither. Can’t find anything. Drawings?”

  
“Yeah, there’s a folder filled with notes and stuff all about it.”

  
“Right, pocket that, if the worst comes to the worst we can blackmail the
bastard.”

  
“Pohl!” came an anguished cry from downstairs. It was male, and sounded like
the sort of person who’d design a machine. Stride peered out and down. Then he
leaned back in and whispered “there’s some nerd with a big oblong bag. And
we’re trapped.”

  
“Machine sized bag?”

  
“Pohl, I need Maquire’s number!”

  
“Yeah. Absolutely.”

  
Bear smiled evilly. “I’m never trapped mate, let’s go do this the old fashioned
way,” Bear grinned, ran out of the bedroom and barrelled down the stairs. Joe
was at the bottom, looking for Pohl in the lounge, and he didn’t have time to
react to the huge figure who ran right into him, slamming Joe against a wall,
and certainly didn’t have time to react to his bag being lifted up as the two
intruders ran out.

  
“You’re a maniac!” Stride called after Bear as they disappeared down the path.
The one at the front was laughing on an adrenaline filled high.

  
Joe was lying where he’d been crushed, finding it hard to breathe, unsure of
what happened. It took him a while to realise someone was calling his name.

  
“Mum? Mum?”

  
“It’s Pohl, but that’ll do.

  
“Mu…errr…”

  
“What happened?”

  
“They took Dee, they took Dee.”

  
“They had your bag Joe, I saw it in their hands as they ran past me. Who were
they?”

  
“Ring Maq, ring Maq, they took Dee!”

  
Given how long it could take to gain full consciousness after a night of
drinking, Dee felt she woke up after this very quickly indeed. That was partly
because when your head ached and the bed was so soft under you it was hard to
move and instead you tunnelled up the duvet, hoping to cocoon yourself away
until the pain stopped. Whereas here you try to curl up and find you can’t move
your arms, because you can’t move your wrists, and your neck aches because your
head is lolling down in front of you. So when you finally shake the grogginess
out of your head, look down, and find you’re tied to a chair, you come the rest
of the way out in one jolt of panic.

  
“Why am I tied to a chair?” Dee wondered, and it crossed her mind she’d got
into some bizarre sex game last night. Was Joe into this and would he soon
enter the room dressed as a monkey? But as her eyes adjusted to the light,
which was low but on, she realised all too well where she was.

  
It wasn’t just that she was tied up in someone’s attic room, because there was
a skylight in the ceiling covered up with black fabric. It wasn’t just the
chair placed against the back wall of said room, or the range of bizarre and
medical looking instruments nearby on the right side. It was the shelf opposite
on which there were jars, and in these jars were eyeballs. She didn’t need
telling they were human eyeballs.

  
So fuck, that’s where you are.

  
Dee looked around, determined not to just sit and wait, but she didn’t have to,
because the room’s only door opened and a woman came in. Tall, bulky, with her
blonde hair tied back into a ponytail.

  
“Excellent, you’re awake!”

  
“Yes I am you Meerkat fucking bitch.”

  
“Mee, how would that be possible?” The door was closed.

  
“You’d shove a Meerkat up…”

  
“Oh, that’s so distasteful.”

  
“Says the woman stealing people’s fucking eyeballs.”

  
“But eyes are so tasty!” and the woman grinned, revealing perfect teeth.

  
“Did you say tasty?”

  
“Yes,” and a jar was opened, an eye pulled out, and taken over to Dee who could
smell some sort of pickling fluid. “Look at how it’s lies in my hand, all gooey
and delicious, like a chocolate mousse or caviar, doesn’t it just wobble
wonderfully it I shake my hand a little,” and she did, “couldn’t you just
gobble it all up!”

  
“Suddenly I regret smirking at vegetarians.”

  
“All the more for me then!” And the woman put the eye to her mouth and bit it
in half, chewing away and grinning.

  
“I preferred it when we thought you were selling them to desperate cornea
patients in the Middle East.”

  
“How wery rawist” the woman said through her chewing.

  
“Nazir said it.” And it would help if Nazir would come running right through
that door.  What was the point of being a fag hag if the gay best friend didn’t
turn up on time?

  
If Maquire had applied the brakes any later he wouldn’t have had to use Dee’s
door, as he’d have been inside away. Running in, he found Nazir stood in the
doorway, looking very worried, and was shown into a lounge were Pohl sat with
Joe, who might as well have little stars and birds revolving around his head.

  
“Is he any better?” Maquire asked, looking at the stricken scientist.

  
“He’s not making much sense but calmed when I said you were en route.”

  
“Good. Does he need a doctor?”

  
“I don’t know. We might have to keep an eye on him.”

  
“Okay, first tell me what happened?”

  
Pohl composed herself and began to run through it. “I returned home to find two
men running out of the property and down the street, and one had the rucksack
and the machine. I came in, found Joe, and he was adamant Dee’s been kidnapped.”

  
“Dee!” Joe slurred.

  
“Right, two men, do you have descriptions or a car registration, what do you
have?”

  
“I ran in before I saw their car, but I know what they look like.”

  
“Dee kidnapped!”

  
“Maybe we should give him something calming, I know Dee has her cupboards full
of things.”