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For a smile as wide as a country sunrise
While we were in the doctor’s house looking around, rather illegally I must admit, we heard a noise outside. It was a car! Sherry had parked our limousine on the street and this car drove up the driveway and parked beside the house. Two men got out and came inside, interestingly they had keys to the house. One of them turned on the lights and we were standing there with our guns out.
Well, all of us except Sky. She appeared behind them and they were soon sleeping peacefully. “They won’t remember anything,” said Sky, “except what I want them to remember.” She turned the lights off again and we put one man on the couch and the other on a big, comfortable looking armchair. Perfect places for them to enjoy a nice nap.
Neither of them matched the picture of the doctor we had, so why were they here? Perhaps to clean out that safe? I took a picture of their driver’s licenses and sent them to Cristy so she can check on them in the morning. I also decided to send their finger prints along, just in case they might be helpful. Cristy got back to me rather quickly, apparently she couldn’t sleep so she was up working.
I think she’s worried about Misty, though I don’t know why, Misty is a very capable fighter and fantastic with a gun. But, they don’t have any family except each other, so that’s why they worry about each other so much. Anyway, these guys are part of a gang from Dublin, though their main headquarters is in Heilbronn, Germany. For some reason that sounds familiar, from a long time ago though.
However, I just can’t quite place the importance of that city. “Hmm, that’s quite a distance from here,” I said, “though Heilbronn isn’t so far from our chateau. The doctor must be part of that gang as well, so maybe they got rid of him for some reason. In the morning get in touch with Jazzy for me please.” “It is morning,” said Cristy.
“I mean real morning,” I said, “when normal people are awake and having breakfast.” “Oh, that late,” she said, “okay, shall do.” “STEVE!” yelled Misty. I came running back to the office. “What is it?” I asked excitedly. “I was just wondering if you were coming back or not,” she said. I looked at her. She smiled. I sighed. “Did you look at these beautiful rubies?” she asked.
That is what she found in that small box behind the safe. She then started talking about each ruby, how it was cut, it’s size and value. I just looked at her. “I have been studying gems with Alfred,” she said. Misty is getting to be more amazing all the time. I told her that just now too. She had tears on her cheeks now and she gave me a big hug.
“Thank you so much my pretend husband,” she said quietly. Every now and then I say the right thing. Meowr.= Me find something in wall. Smell like human people. We began looking for a way to open that wall panel. The walls in the office were made of wood panels about 30 inches (about 75cm) wide.
I was bent over looking when Misty moved a picture on the wall and the panel swung open, quickly, and hit me on the head. “Hey Steve,” said Misty, “there’s a body in the wall.” I didn’t answer. Misty looked. “Did you hit your head?” she asked, “You should be more careful, you might hurt yourself.” “Actually, I think I was attacked,” I said, somewhat sarcastically.
She pulled her gun out quickly and looked around the dark room with her flashlight. “I don’t see anyone Steve,” she said and she put her gun away. I was behind her now and put my hand on her shoulder. In hindsight, that was probably not a good thing to do in a dark room. Misty grabbed my hand and threw me over her shoulder and onto the floor, flat on my back.
Must admit, I’m glad to be a ghost right now, or whatever it is I am. I might get killed otherwise. “I got one!” Misty called out. The others came running quickly to the office. “You got Steve,” said Sky. Misty dropped to her knees beside me. “I’m sorry Steve,” she said, crying, “I thought you were a bad guy.” “You are really improving with your fighting,” I said.
“Sky has been teaching me a lot lately,” she said. Misty certainly doesn’t waste her time, studying with Mac, Alfred and Sky. I wonder what else she does? We took what we have already found out to the car. “What about the man in the wall?” asked Sky. “He’s the doctor we have been looking for,” I told her, “we should tell the police, but if we do that then this will become an active police investigation and we will be out.
So, we will just close this door and pretend we didn’t find him. After all, we are in the house illegally too, so that really doesn’t help us.” “Good thinking,” said Misty, “we make good burglars.” I then went over to close the safe. “Wait Steve,” said Misty, “there are two more secret compartments in there. See those three dots? That means 3 compartments.
Push the name plate on the left side and the bottom pops up.” She slid out the panel and inside was a lot of paperwork for this gang. I told the girls to start taking pictures of all those papers, then we will put them back so the gang doesn’t know we found them. Then Misty opened the third compartment and inside was a lone key.
I wanted to take that key, but then they would know we found the paperwork. “Here, let me,” said Misty. She pulled a little box out of her backpack and put the key inside and closed the box. Then she removed the key and put it back in the safe. “Now we have an exact replica of that key,” she said smiling, “I have been studying about keys and locks with Suzette, she is just amazing.”
“You are the amazing one Misty,” I said, “I better stop picking on you.” “Don’t you dare,” she said smiling, “I enjoy that, so does Cristy.” “Daylight arriving soon,” said Sherry. We all got back out to the car and drove away. When we got back to the house there were two ambulances and 3 police cars already there. I told the girls to wait and got out to see what was happening.
Aileen does get up early, right at dawn, so Aoife and I do as well. When I got closer the police surrounded me and demanded to see some identification, which I gave them. The officer said I was under arrest and one of them put handcuffs on me. Sigh. The girls saw this and came out to help.
I melted the handcuffs off me and Sky demanded to know what was going on. “These two men (pointing to Aoife’s brothers) saw this man (referring to me) shoot these two women. “Impossible,” said Sky, “he has been with us all night until now.” Aoife and Aileen had been shot, about 10 minutes before we got back…
To Be Continued.
©2025 Steve McLeod.
We were in Ireland right now for the funeral of Aoife’s father. He supposedly died of a heart attack, but after looking at his chest, I doubt that very much. I called Dr. Jorgenson right away, he is our main doctor and surgeon. He also is licensed to do autopsies. I explained this to him and he said there was no way that had to do with any autopsy.
He suggested looking at the back of the body too, but for that we will need legal permission. Sienna had a lawyer here with us already, just in case. She knows us very well already, and with us, things are never normal. He quickly had the paperwork done which gave us permission to look at the body more closely and do our own autopsy.
Dr. Jorgenson arrived that day and the body was transported to the nearest hospital, with us guarding it all the way. Unfortunately a problem came up, apparently Aileen, Aoife’s mother, needed to give her permission which she had agreed to do, but when she arrived at the hospital to sign the papers, she changed her mind and said no.
Aoife, Beryan (she is Aoife’s best friend and well known to Aileen as she used to live just down the street from them), Sky and Misty tried talking to her, but she still said no. Then I tried, along with Aoife. I told her she did not need to be afraid of anyone. I then explained who I was and what our organization is all about.
“We can provide you with protection,” I told her, “someone killed your husband, we want to find the people who did it or they will keep doing this to other people. Please help us, give us your permission.” She thought for a little while, then went over to the desk and signed the papers. Dr. Jorgenson was soon doing the autopsy and found that Aoife’s father had been shot three times, once right in the heart.
He pulled the bullets out to show us. Aileen told us later that after her husband had been shot she received a phone call from a woman who told her not to say anything or Aoife would be killed next. Strange that the woman would not threaten the two sons instead, since they are close at hand and Aoife is not.
The fact that she was a woman was not lost on me either, especially in light of what had happened already back home. I asked Aileen if the woman had left her name, but she said no. It could be a coincidence, but with us nothing seems to be coincidence. But what could possibly be the relationship between Aoife’s father and us?
It just doesn’t make much sense to me. Finn and Garrett don’t seem to be much concerned by the death of their father. However, Aoife said they never got along with their father. I told Aoife she needs to stay with her mother, along with some of the other girls in order to protect her mother. Aileen insisted I need to stay at the house too, she did not like the idea of us being separated.
The police were out looking for the original doctor who supposedly did the original autopsy but have been unable to find him. That is kind of strange. He hasn’t booked off sick or anything, so he should be around. They phoned him, but no answer. They went to his home, but no answer there either. And it didn’t look like anyone was home either, even his car was gone.
I thought that was kind of strange. After everyone was asleep, I left the house and Sherry picked me up in the car, along with Sky, Misty, Milena, Aasta, Carine and Brandy. We also had Storm, Azura and Jewel with us. I left Muffin and Tracker with Aoife. We went driving down the street and up to the doctor’s house, without the car lights on.
There were no street lights along that street either, which was helpful. We went in the side door of the house, Sky going in and unlocking the door for everyone else. We looked around the house but we were not finding anything unusual. Brandy turned on the laptop and figured out the password quickly so she was soon looking around at things.
However, she couldn’t find anything unusual there either. We are not doing so good. He had a small office in his house so I spent my time looking around in there. He had a couple old style filing cabinets in one corner and I noticed a couple of curved scratch marks on the floor, barely noticeable. The cabinets would not move though.
Then I spotted a small button under the shelves over the cabinets and pressed it. The cabinets moved out of the way, like a door. Behind them was a safe. Hmm, this is when we need Mac, but he isn’t here. So, I tried something that Sky showed me and soon the safe was open. “Well done, my twin,” said Sky from behind me. I could not believe all the money in that safe.
“Well, what now Steve?” asked Sky. “Quite simple, we take that money with us,” I said, “someone will notice it gone eventually and they will want it back. Then they will likely contact us.” “How will they know who took it?” she asked again. “I will leave a note,” I said, “but not a normal note, that would be too easy.” I asked Misty to write a note to our friends, in a fun sort of way.
She wrote, “Dear friends, a cat chased a squirrel, a dog chased the cat, a human chased the dog, a ghost chased the human, the wind chased the ghost and the money blew away. Your friend, Miss Tee.” She showed it to me. “That’s perfect Misty,” I said. “It doesn’t make sense,” said Sky. “That’s the point,” said Misty, “it’s just to make them think that it makes sense.”
“I don’t get it,” said Sky. “Neither will they,” I said, “and that’s what we want.” “It is?” asked Sky, “How will they know what it means when it doesn’t mean anything and they won’t even know who wrote it.” “That’s the point,” I said, “it will keep them busy trying to figure out what it means.”
“I still don’t get it,” said Sky. I put the note in the safe. “Hey, don’t lock it yet,” said Misty, “are you not going to look in the back?” She reached in and removed a false panel at the back of the safe. “How did you know about that?” I asked.
“This model of safe always has a false panel at the back,” she said, “I have been studying about safes with Mac.” She smiled. She also pulled out a small box from behind that panel. “Wow, look at these beauties!” she exclaimed…” Before she finished we heard a noise outside.
To Be Continued.
©2025 Steve McLeod.
Steve`s Country 