Visiting Verity Book Three in the Detective Veronica Reason Series

Prologue

If yoU want youre sOn back alive, geT £100 thousund. Tell me wen you got iT by you hang the white clotH under the stone on tHe wall out front. No polise or he is dead.

Tom Gibbens kicked himself for not thinking of it earlier; this just might be the easiest way to make money he had ever encountered. He reached the age of twenty seven and never made more than a few hundred pounds in a week. Now he had set himself up to make a hundred thousand pounds in less than a month. It would be like taking candy from a baby. He folded the piece of paper and placed it inside a makeshift envelope, crafted from a page out of yesterday’s Sun newspaper. He would hide it under the loose stone in the wall outside the house where the family were staying. He would do it tonight around midnight. No one would see him stop outside the expensive house. The wall ran along the road about fifty yards from the house. Even if they were up, they wouldn’t see him stop on his motorcycle.

He went into the bedroom to check on his captive. Anton Faber lay on his back, his wrists taped to the rail of the sturdy iron framed bed above his head, his ankles secured by ropes to the bedframe. He slept, limp and weakened by his hours of fighting against the restraints. He had given up an hour ago when his captor had left him alone. Anton told the smiling man everything he asked and begged to be allowed to return to his family. Tom responded to him with a laugh in his voice.

That’s up to your old man. All he has to do is pay me the money and you can go home.

Chapter One

Friday night

Veronica Reason, forty-three and proud of every year of it, gripped the sturdy cast-iron rail across the head of the ornate Victorian bed and hung on for dear life. Her body shook and vibrated in uncontrolled lust. She gasped for breath and moaned in ecstasy. He words tumbled out between rapid breaths.

Oh my God, don’t stop, just keep it there. Uhmmm, This is fucking fantastic. Arghh! More, more. Does it go faster?

Veronica screamed as she thrashed around on the bed. She journeyed recklessly on a lustful roller coaster to a distant, erotic and exotic place she had never before visited. Her body buzzed and hummed as Jenny, kneeling between her widespread thighs, concentrated on delivering every variation the newly purchased toy offered in the rather sparse instructions. Three speeds and two motions was all it offered but it seemed to be doing more than enough right now, decided Jenny. Jenny had told Veronica that she bought the buzzing device, ‘just for fun’ when she removed it from its tiny red silk purse an hour earlier. Veronica was having ‘fun’ like she had never experienced ‘fun’ in her entire adult life. She writhed and moaned as the ultimate physical phenomena short of death ended in a crashing explosion of sinful, shuddering delight. Jenny assessed it as a ten on the Richter scale. Veronica’s screams as she came reverberated throughout the cottage. Jenny, suitably impressed by the results, said,

Thank heaven there are no neighbours nearby!

Jenny waited a moment until the aftershocks in Veronica’s lower body became mere tremors. She moved her head away from the cauldron between Veronica’s legs and sat back on her haunches. She switched off her new toy and rested her hands on the inside of Veronica’s silky thighs. Moments later, Veronica’s legs stopped jerking and thrashing around the bed. Veronica shuddered once more, a two on the Richter scale of orgasms and finally relaxed, letting go of the railing above her head.

Jeez, what is that? asked Veronica; her tone bordering on disgusted.

Jenny held up the vibrator for her inspection. It was about five inches long and not much thicker than her big toe. The purple silky covering looked a little out of place but it did not prevent it from working superbly.

It’s a Supersex multi-function bullet vibrator. I got it on line for nine-ninety-nine from Sinful Secrets. Not too shabby for a first attempt, eh? Who would have thought such a tiny thing could produce such huge results? replied Jenny.

No, I don’t mean that lovely little thing; here, this sticky stuff on my hands. It feels like some sort of glue. Touch the rail, here. What is that? said Veronica.

Yeuk! It feels like the glue on duct tape. I know all about that stuff. Malcolm used it to fix everything around the house. They use it in the RAF to repair aircraft, so he said. I think the pilots keep a roll in their flight bags. Why is there duct tape on your bed frame? It’s not broken.

That is a very good question. I need to put my detective hat on for a moment. I’ll take it off again, I promise. said Veronica.

As long as that is all you put on, then it’s okay. I love you just the way you are. An imaginary hat is alright, for a while. said Jenny.

Veronica sat up and turned to look at the white painted cast iron rail. The top rail of the head of the bed ran from post to post across the bed-head, a sturdy tube two inches in diameter. The vertical rails were a half inch in diameter. She picked up the bedside light on her side of the bed and examined the rail more closely. Veronica spoke to herself as if she held a mobile phone on record, which if this were a crime scene, she would have been using.

There is a sticky residue on the cross rail of the bed. The stickiness extends for six inches close to the joint of the upright bed leg. There is another stretch of the same stickiness two and a half feet from the first, roughly in the middle of the bed. It looks as if someone’s hands were taped to the bed. When I lie down on the bed and raise my arms, that’s where they’d be tied. As long as I had a pillow or two under my head it wouldn’t be too uncomfortable. I imagine that if their hands were tied, then so were the feet. said Veronica.

Jenny was admiring the tone of Veronica’s naked breasts and her taut stomach as she stretched her arms above her head and held the railing once again. Veronica got off the bed and walked to the door. She switched on the overhead light, flooding the room in bright soft-tone light. She returned and began searching the frame of the bed. Evidently, the light was still not bright enough for her needs. She went to her bag in the corner of the room and returned with a small black metal torchlight. She got on her knees and looked more closely at the long rail that made the main frame of the bed. Jenny sat naked on the small sofa under the window and admired the delightful view of Veronica’s backside as she shuffled along the ornate rug beside the bed on her knees and elbows. Veronica peered closely, paused and returned to her bag. Brandishing a pair of eyebrow tweezers, she knelt again and plucked a tiny strand of fibre from between the frame and a cross-rail. She walked over to the bedside light, held it up to her face and said,

Looks like rope. Old fashioned sisal rope. Looks fairly new too. It’s still a bit yellow. It goes almost white as it ages. My guess is I am going to find more on the other side. said Veronica.

She removed a tissue from the box on the bedside table and laid the tiny fibre on it before folding it several times and placing it in the drawer. She moved around to the other side of the bed and repeated the sequence, minutely examining the frame. She stood up, the tweezers held aloft as she showed Jenny another yellow fibre. She added it to the first in the tissue and tucked it back in the drawer.

Someone about my size has been tied to this bed, and it wasn’t me. Why would anyone be tied to my bed? Now we know why the sheets were messed up and dirty. Good job we brought spares with us. said Veronica.

Bondage? We can try that too. I bought some silk ties. Malcolm has loads of them. said Jenny.

Maybe later. Now I have to figure out what went on here. But first, we need to eat… Not like that you bugger, I mean food. I’m starving. Do we shower now or bedtime?

Let’s shower later. I quite like the smell of you on me. I promise to wash my hands before I do the salad though. Here, put this on. said Jenny.

Jenny rummaged in her bag on the floor and handed Veronica a pale blue silk robe adorned with friendly golden dragons chasing smiling, scantily clad girls with parasols.

Malcolm bought me one of these every time he went to Asia. I never had the opportunity to wear them all. I have about ten of them.

She admired Veronica as she slipped the kimono over her lightly muscled body. It looked good on her and she looked good in it. Jenny decided it was time to hit the gym once again as she eyed the tone of Veronica’s supple body. There was not an ounce of fat to be seen. They went through to the small kitchen and set about getting the evening meal ready.

Veronica had cheated earlier and shopped at Waitrose before they left Bristol. She bought ready prepared mixed green salad, cold cuts of smoked salmon, cured ham and a small Brie wrapped in waxed paper in a neat wooden box. Jenny distributed the salad onto two large white plates. Veronica cut the fresh Chiabata into several large slices and lashed them with salted butter. She bought with her a small glass jar of her own special mix salad dressing; a concoction she learned from her late husband. She shook the jar vigorously to mix the olive oil and balsamic vinegar along with the other secret ingredients; two drops of Tabasco, two shakes of Lea and Perrins and a dash of sesame seed oil. The two cloves of lightly crushed garlic remained in the jar for about two months before she changed them. They carried the meal out through the two-piece back door. Jenny returned to the darkened kitchen and moments later placed two lit candles on the table, adding to the romantic atmosphere. They sat at the circular wooden table outside on the small terrace at the rear of the house, secluded on every side from prying eyes. They ate in companionable silence, savouring each mouthful. They chatted and sipped at the dark, red wine, finishing the bottle a little after ten-thirty. The light faded to a dark purple glow on the western horizon off to their left. The longest day would dawn in a little over five hours. They clinked their glasses together and wished each other a quiet, peaceful holiday. Little did they know…

Chapter Two

Friday afternoon and evening

Veronica Reason and Jenny Sinclair’s holiday began earlier that day, at five o’clock on Friday. Veronica tapped the horn twice on her green Mk II Mini Cooper S and waited impatiently to begin their much needed week of hedonistic pleasure. A minute later, Jenny, her closest and only friend in Bristol, stepped out of the front door of her semi-detached Edwardian house in Clifton. She slammed the heavy glass panelled door shut behind her and skipped along the path to the garden gate. Over her left shoulder she carried a blue canvas holdall with a large, well-worn leather handbag swinging from her right hand. She wore blue jeans cut-off at mid-calf and a loosely fitting Harlequins’ rugby shirt. The shirt could not be described as a fashion statement with the various coloured quarters; she wore it because it belonged to her late husband. The last time she wore it was on holiday in south Wales with him a week before he died in a training accident in north Wales when his fighter jet had been clipped by his wingman who had banked right instead of left, as briefed. She opened the passenger door, tipped the seat forward and dumped both bags on the back seat of the tiny car. Veronica’s bags and the shopping for the weekend were in the cramped boot, out of sight. Jenny sat in the passenger seat and leaned across to touch cheeks with Veronica. The two women smiled and held hands for a few seconds.

Their destination lay over one hundred miles away, in a small hamlet near Ilfracombe in Devon. Veronica and her late husband bought the cottage three years ago, just before he died, anticipating his imminent retirement. Cephus married late in life, over fifty, smitten by the young and very pretty detective newly arrived in his office. The twenty-five year difference in age bothered neither of them for one moment. The cottage belonged to a maiden aunt on Veronica’s mother’s side of the family. She lived there since her birth and died in the front bedroom very nearly a century later. Veronica and Cephus had intended using it as a weekend retreat, a holiday home, and to let it out in the summer months to friends and family. She had been once, a few weeks after they bought it. She had almost forgotten it existed. She paid the bills by direct debit and barely noticed the small sum going out every month for gardening and the electric and council tax bills. After Cephus and her two daughters died in a terrible car crash, Veronica handed the management and maintenance of the cottage over to an agency in Ilfracombe.

Veronica had recently finished a long and somewhat arduous few weeks of court appearances when she remembered she owned the cottage in Devon. Veronica’s role as primary witness in a murder, attempted murder, embezzlement, corruption and theft case meant she took the stand on several occasions. Eleven weeks later, the jury convicted the three accused men, Veronica stayed in London for the whole eleven weeks of the trial. The accused men worked in the Education Ministry. They conspired to steal twenty-six million pounds and to kill the investigating officer who was going to expose their crimes. The police officer’s name was Cephus Reason, Veronica’s husband.

Veronica made a silent promise to Cephus and her daughters that these scum would suffer for their crimes. She never admitted it to anyone, apart from Jenny, that she regretted the abolition of capital punishment in many instances, this being one of them. The reckoning had come when everyone least expected it. The men had been in custody for several months, the dust had settled and the case closed when the guilty verdict was handed down on all three of them. Just the sentencing hearing to round things off remained. Three weeks after the trial, the men were on their way from Belmarsh prison in south-east London to the hearing at the Old Baily in central London. The Q9 armoured van carrying the prisoners unexpectedly veered off the road near the Woolwich ferry. It jumped up onto the pavement, smashed through two concrete pillars, a stout iron railing, and splashed in the fast flowing River Thames. The ebb tide carried the sinking van downstream.

It took the salvage team four days to recover the truck from where it settled on the muddy riverbed nearly a mile away from the crash site. The driver and guard escaped, sat on the cab for a minute to catch their breath and swam to the nearby ferry without injury. The three occupants, the prisoners in the rear cabin, had drowned. Missing fingernails and bloodied hands and feet showed the desperate lengths they had gone in trying to escape. The police investigation determined it took three to four hours for the rear cabin of the truck to completely fill with water. Veronica prayed that it had taken twice as long. A coroner’s inquiry into the accident put the blame on the poor maintenance of the truck. A vital pin worked loose, and the steering failed just as the driver rounded the sharp curve leading to the ferry entrance. The firm faced a substantial fine for breaching Health & Safety regulations. She silently thanked those involved in the elaborate staging of the ‘accident’.

Veronica owed a few favours to a few police officers and two security guards but was more than happy to be in their debt. Whatever it took was fine with her. She whispered to Cephus and the girls, telling them their ghosts could now rest since the brief restoration of capital punishment. It was more appropriate than hanging, she decided. The