Dead Quiet

By Ian Aspley

It is a cold November night, close to bonfire night. After one loud scream from an old lady, who was walking her dog late one night, taking a shortcut through the churchyard. Two young girls from a nearby pub come running to the women’s aid. She discovers what appears to be a fallen tramp slumped up against a headstone in a pool of blood. Detectives Abbot and Peters are assigned to the murder case but just as it gets underway yet another murder is reported in the very same churchyard.

Could these two suspicious double murders be connected? Abbot and Peters begin to realise that these crimes committed are not all what they seem. With Abbots marriage on the rocks, can she balance her marriage as well as the investigation?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Release date: Apr 2, 2022
• ISBN: 9781803138909

Ian Aspley

Ian Aspley, born in Nuneaton, studied TV & Media Production at Noth Warwickshire College of Technology and Art in 1992. Which is when Ian first started writing Novel and Screenplays. Having such a keen interest in fictional murders Ian decided to write Dead Quiet, the first in a series of ten books.

Book preview

9781803138909.jpg

Copyright © 2022 Ian Aspley

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Matador

Unit E2 Airfield Business Park,

Harrison Road, Market Harborough,

Leicestershire. LE16 7UL

Tel: [phone]

Email: [e-mail]

Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador

Twitter: @matadorbooks

ISBN 9781803138909

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM, BY PHOTOCOPYING OR BY ANY ELECTRONIC OR MECHANICAL MEANS, INCLUDING INFORMATION STORAGE OR RETRIEVAL SYSTEMS, WITHOUT PERMISSION IN WRITING FROM BOTH THE COPYRIGHT OWNER AND THE PUBLISHER OF THIS BOOK.

To Karen who has believed in my work and in me.

With all my heart I'd like to say thank you.

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

About the Author

Chapter 1

The grey clouds raced in front of a full moon. But the cold November sky was being pelted by a stream of multicoloured fireworks. Two exited children with their parents stood open mouthed pointing up towards the darkened sky watching it being painted red then green. Another then another. The air was being chocked by the smoke and the smell of gun powder. But the old lady taking her dog for a walk, didn’t give them a second glance. But she hoped they would pass over soon. Her dog growled as two drunken youths staggered past her talking loosely about the attractive new barmaid in the CAT AND MOUSE public house just up the road. She stood and watched them disappear down High Street. She had no choice her dog had just decided to cock it’s leg up a dimly lit streetlight. Walking on again, she turned off the busier street then turned into a narrow alleyway which took her away from the noisy pubs and clubs. Eventually it would take her through the cemetery and back home. Once out of the alleyway, she strolled past several locked-up garages and boarded up shops that was awaiting to be demolished. Wire meshed fencing protected its surroundings from anymore mindless vandalism. It was once a thriving little street. Until a big supermarket chain was built which saw to that. Not a soul was about. The street was deserted. Only the street lights that lined the road would keep her company. The tall bare branched trees started to creak and sway in a rising wind. She had walked this street many times before. How many times. She would not like to say. But as more fireworks illuminated the sky, she had an uneasy feeling about tonight. For some reason she had the worrying sense that she was being followed. She thought she could hear a set of footsteps echoing behind her. Suddenly she stopped dead in her tracks, then turned up her fake fur collar from the biting wind. She slowly half turned, but nobody was there. She rolled her eyes as she looked down at her whimpering dog. She started to walk off again until she noticed a young boy of about fifteen sheltering in an empty shop doorway trying to keep out the nighttime chill. As she got nearer to him. On the ground next to him lay a stuffed Guy Fawkes. The teenager started to ring out in song

Remember, remember the fifth of November, gunpowder, treason and plot, penny for the Guy Mrs? he said holding out his hand as she was about to walk past.

No thank you she said hurrying past him.

Miserable cow he muttered under his breath.

Finally, she had reached the churchyard. She sighed deeply into the air as she opened the squeaky metal gate. She walked through it making the gate clang shut noisily behind her. The church stood on her left which had weathered over time. Centuries of harsh weather had beaten hard against it. It still stood proud and tall in the shimmering moon light with the hint of the odd colour of fireworks exploding behind it. The dog stopped to sniff its surroundings making the woman stop in her tracks again. She frowned as she looked over in the distance to her left. In the shades of the dim orange lamp glow, she noticed what looked like another Guy Fawkes. But this one didn’t seem to have an owner! This one was slumped up against a headstone dressed in shabby clothes. She wondered over to it. She screamed only the once, but it was enough to get the attention of two teenage girls heading home from a night out further up the street. After running towards the woman. The girls found her sobbing uncontrollably on the ground next to her dog. Her hands clenched tight up against her face. One of the teenagers looked down at the slumped figure. Gasping, she immediately dialed the emergency number.

They’re on their way, it will be a couple of minutes before they arrive said the young girl putting her phone back into her shoulder bag.

On hearing that, the old lady continued to cry and shaking her head in panic.

I must get home; my husband will be worrying where I am she spluttered.

Everything’s going to be ok said the other young girl putting her arm around her.

The full moon appeared from behind the racing clouds. Shedding light on the three huddled figures now standing in the churches doorway. In the distance the wind carried the sound of sirens from a nearby street. A couple of long minutes later, and the approach of a panda car screeched to a halt lighting up everything blue in its wake. One of the uniformed officers alighted from his panda car armed with a torch and straightening his cap as he slammed his car door shut whilst the other stayed in the warmth of the car radioing back to the station. He switched on his torch, and then headed up the dimly lit path finding the figures standing in the shadows waiting for him.

What seems to be the trouble ladies? he said shining his torch at them.

There’s a dead body lying beside that headstone said one of the young girls pointing towards it.

You sure it’s not a guy Madam, it is the season for Guys? he said patronizingly.

Do you think this poor woman would be in this state if it was just a stuffed Guy? said the other still hugging the woman. He walked over to the headstone in question still shining his torch. That is when he noticed the slumped figure lying in a fresh pool of blood. He fumbled for his radio on his lapel, then radioed back to his colleague still sitting in the warmth of the car.

Alpha one, come in, over.

Alpha one, what is it, don’t tell me the old ladies scared of the dark? he said through the static of his radio.

No, it’s more than that, we have a dead corpse on our hands.

At the end of a long tiring shift all that Detective Sergeant Karen Abbot wanted to do is put her feet up in front of the fire and maybe relax with a little light TV, and a nice glass of wine to finish off her day. By the time she got home, hopefully the children should be in bed asleep and her husband Richard would have made her something nice to eat. Nothing too fancy, as Richard didn’t like foreign mucked about stuff. His words not hers. Something along the lines of a cottage pie or cheese on toast. That was all about he could master anyway. But at least it would be hot and edible. Well, that was what she was hoping anyway. Hoping he had made something, at least especially with things being frosty in the air between the two of them lately. Just then her office desk phone rang interrupting her from her thoughts. She rolled her eyes, as she glanced at her wristwatch. Should she answer it or leave it to ring?

Chapter 2

Karen Abbot was a stunner. She was in her early fifties with shoulder length brown hair, slim build, and deep brown eyes with high cheek bones to match. Her skin as smooth as a peach. Smoothing down her red knee length skirt she checked on her makeup in her small vanity mirror she just got out from her top desk draw. Just then her door knocked loudly.

Come in she shouted.

The door flung wide open, and Sergeant Ian Peter’s poked his head around it. Sergeant Ian Peter’s was Abbots former colleague. He’d been working with her on and off for a number of years now ever since she arrived in uniform from her old station. Her old station had been in Greenock, about eight miles out of Glasgow. But that had to close down due to lack of resources. Which really didn’t help matters due to the increase in crime there. Abbot got despondent with matters in Scotland. That’s why she headed for a new beginning here. Ryde police station on the Isle of Wight. As a Scottish newcomer she fitted in really well. She quickly got promoted through the ranks. A little to quickly for some long-serving officers in the force who held a slight grudge. Rumours around the station joked that they might have slept together at some point in their career. But her only regret was that the hours were not nine to five as was in Scotland. Abbot liked the sound of a slower pace of life. Hence her move to the island. But she soon realised after moving here she’d be working even longer hours by picking up the pieces of holiday makers drunken behaviour. Richard her husband didn’t want to move. He liked it where he was. It had been a difficult decision for them both. Working

Reviews for Dead Quiet

[fredflintsmith · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Don't bother to write any more of the ten you planned. This is terrible and the world has no need of more incoherent illogical writing.