YOU CAN ALWAYS COUNT ON AN ACCOUNTANT TO CAUSE YOU TROUBLE!

This is the first chapter of a murder mystery book that I have just started. I will continue to write "Unwrapping Gifts" the sequel to my first book "The Unwanted Gifts" but this and some short stories will hopefully go in between the two, to give readers a different view of the material I write.


I was just closing my computer shop for the night, all my staff having gone home. I had just washed up the mugs and plates utilised by me and my staff of students that worked in my shop to supplement their student loans. I headed out the front of the shop and locked the double doors below the sign that read ‘THE DOCTORS COMPUTER SHOP’. I was just lowering the metal shutter when I heard a noise from the side or back of the building. This area was always out of bounds to anyone, but staff or friends set as it was behind a heavy metal door that was 8 feet high.  I made my way to the door and punched the entry code into the mechanical entry panel. The gate unlocked and I slowly eased the door open, hoping that it wouldn’t squeak as it sometimes did, alerting a person or persons that I could now clearly hear moving around the back of the building. I stooped down and picked up a weighty black metal bar that was about 18 inches long and about 3 inches in diameter. This bar was kept there as it was occasionally required to be used to prize open the front shutter of the shop when the electrics didn’t work properly because of an electrical malfunction or a blown fuse. I had thought it would also be useful if I were faced with an unwelcome visitor or visitors who had been able to penetrate the stockade at the side of the building which led to my private area. This had never happened before but appeared to have happened or be happening now. I gripped the bar and brandished it ready for use if required at whoever my uninvited visitor or visitors were. As I turned the corner, I was met by a person approaching the corner of the white painted building. The person was close and seemed to be trying to become invisible at the back of the building, but it wasn’t possible against the white painted brickwork, but they tried none the less. The persons hands were outstretched at shoulder height, whether because they had seen the metal bar that I was wielding, ready to make impact with them I wasn’t sure. They were wincing and almost cowering, preparing themselves for any pain that they might feel following me bringing the weapon down against their shoulder and body. When I got a full view of the person who had invaded my private space, I dropped the long metal bar which landed on the floor making a loud clang as it crashed onto the weathered patio. My arm and my body were still moving, and I ended up crashing into my uninvited visitor crushing her between my body and the wall like a piece of meat being pressed between two slices of bread in a freshly made sandwich. There was a sound of material rasping against brick, like sandpaper on wood and then a guttural sound as the woman was confined in the space between the wall and my body and arms that I used to stop myself crashing my head into the equally weathered brickwork.

Time seemed to slow, vision and events had blurred, I was trying to get a grip of the situation and closed my eyes momentarily as I leant my head back to make sure that my forehead didn’t headbutt the wall. After what seemed quite a long period of time but was only probably less than a minute, I looked down. The visitor who was currently crushed between my body and the wall was a young brunette woman, she was wearing a high quality bright red coat, and appeared to be in some discomfort at present sandwiched between me and the coarse brickwork. I stepped back and the woman exhaled a large amount of air and I imagine would have crumpled to the floor had I not taken hold of her by her biceps and held her up. I shuffled her towards a black metal patio chair that surrounded a round metal table that was utilised by me and my staff during meal breaks and quiet periods when we had no or few customers, and I sat her down. The woman who appeared to be in her early thirties, put her head in her hands in her lap and became quite emotional as her body and emotions seemed to go from panic into shock. I could hear her crying and her shoulders were shaking as were her knees and legs. I just watched the woman sat quite distraught reliving what had happened and what might have happened, unable I think to separate the two thoughts. After a few minutes when the woman had regained some composure but whose hands were still visibly shaking as were her knees. I took out my white handkerchief and handed it to what I could see was an attractive woman who was wearing an expensive diamond wedding ring. I glanced at her and smiled, and she gave me the briefest of smiles back as she took the freshly pressed item that she was unfolding as she prepared to use it to dry her eyes and blow her nose which was running unattended by its owner whilst she tried to gather herself and work out what to do next. Once she had regained control of herself and realised that she was not in imminent danger, she just looked up at me, her green eyes showing how vulnerable she felt. I introduced myself, “Patrick Jackson, but most people round here just call me ‘Doc.’ because of the shop name.” The woman smiled and stood up and said, “I know who you are a detective in the Metropolitan Police told me your name, what you were known as and where I could find you.” I was perplexed by this piece of information. Why would a detective in the Metropolitan Police give a stranger my address and more importantly why. The woman who was still breathing slightly irregularly put out her well-manicured right hand and said, “My name is Siobhan Groves” in a well-spoken Irish accent. I took her hand and shook it gently and as gentlemanly as I could to try to make up for the way in which we had met. I said warily, “Why would you be given my name and address by a detective in the Metropolitan Police.?” She said, “It’s complicated, and not easily explained!” I replied, “I’m not sure I want to get involved in anything to do with the Metropolitan Police, I like to keep my distance from the authorities, but I suppose I need to find out how they might think I would want to be involved in this, whatever it is?” I asked one more question, “How did you get past the gate at the back, it has a code, I take it the police didn’t give you that as well?” Siobhan replied, “The gate wasn’t shut, it was ajar, so I just came in to wait for you, the woman detective said you lived above the shop.” I now knew that Brian Sayer my almost full-time shop assistant and video gamer had left the gate-open when he brought his mountain bike out to go home. I now also knew who the detective in question was, Detective Seargent Claire Todd, an officer with whom I had had dealings before. I asked, “Why didn’t you just come into the shop?” Siobhan replied precisely with an accent as soft as the water from the spring of life that she had not wanted to go into the shop as she didn’t want to draw attention to herself!” I said, “Why if you didn’t want to draw attention to yourself, did you wear the brightest red coat you could buy?” Siobhan replied, “It is my favourite coat, and I didn’t think anyone would notice1” I countered with “You are an attractive well-dressed woman the like of which we don’t generally see around here, we only usually see tee-shirts, jeans and hoodies worn in this neighbourhood, and anyone would clock your red coat from a mile away!” Siobhan lowered her head in thought before she said, “I didn’t think about it that way!” I looked up towards the heavens and smiled at the bemused woman that thought she had done everything right to this point and had managed to do everything imaginable wrong. I said, “Come on, I think we both need a drink!” She looked startled and said, “So you will help me, will you? The detective said you probably would.” I smiled and said, “I don’t know if I’m going to help you, or if I can help you, but I’m willing to listen to you as I haven’t bashed your brains in with this metal bar, which I picked up and leant against the wall. Siobhan didn’t take her eyes off it for a second until we were both at least six feet away from it. She asked, “Why do you carry a metal bar like that?” I replied, I don’t I use it to prize the shutter open if the power goes down and I keep it by the gate in case.” She frowned, her face looking slightly worried once more. I continued, “In case I have unwelcome visitors” “Like me,” she said. I replied, “I am undecided as to whether you are a visitor that is unwelcome, I suppose it depends on what you want, so let’s go upstairs have a drink, perhaps something to eat and I will then decide if you are an unwelcome guest.” Siobhan turned to wait for me to lead, and I saw that the back of her coat was covered in white paint from the brickwork which I managed eventually to brush off her coat with my hands. I smiled and she said, “Thank you.” I said, “I have a feeling you are going to be very high maintenance.” To which she replied, “I am out off my depth, I am usually in full control and quite confident, but I don’t have a clue what I am doing or what I need to do?” I gave her a hug and said, “Well we will have to see if we can make any sense of the situation or problem and if I can help or if indeed anything can be done to solve this complicated problem that you have.” She didn’t pull away from my hugging her and just smiled and said, “I don’t usually like being hugged by people I don’t know well but I like being hugged by you, I feel safe which I haven’t since my brother was murdered!” I was slightly taken aback by this information but just gripped her harder and for a while longer before I pointed to the metal stairs and led her up to the door of the flat and unlocked the door and welcomed her into my home.

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