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  After a second’s pause to take it all in, Alice bolted straight into the middle of the action. She headed for the man who appeared to be in charge, the three stripes on his shoulder signaling he was a sergeant.

  “Excuse me. Can you tell me what’s going on here?”

  The sergeant looked down at Alice, trying to make eye contact while she tried equally hard to avoid it. “You shouldn’t be here,” he barked and turned to a uniformed officer standing a short distance away. “PC Penrose, please secure the area properly. I don’t need extra feet muddying up the crime scene.”

  “The crime scene?” Alice gasped. “I heard someone had died, but I didn’t—”

  “We don’t know anything yet. Until we do—” the sergeant motioned for Alice to move back off the land.

  “But those are my bees,” she protested. “I need to check and see they’re okay. My friend said you thought they might have something to do with the death.”

  “Your bees? Ah.” The man paused in thought for a moment, then nodded. “Good. Stay here, then. I’ll just consult with someone and come back. Don’t move!”

  While the PC rolled the bright yellow tape across the entrance, in time to keep out the tangle of reporters, Alice stood in place. The surrounding confusion resolved into a pattern as she waited and watched.

  A group of men and women were conducting a search, a line of them stepping forward in unison then scouring the small patch of ground around their feet. Others were examining a trail of destruction across the section.

  Even with her untrained eyes, Alice could make out the trail she presumed the dead man had taken. Broken branches and trampled grass formed a crazily curving line from near the roadside edge of the section. Alice traced the path, then took a sharp intake of breath.

  The trail led straight into the hives. One of them had been knocked over, with the frames spilling out onto the grass. Another had twisted, turning it at right angles to the others.

  She wanted to run across and check the damage, but the order the sergeant had given Alice froze her feet on the spot. In a place like this, with police everywhere, it would all too easy to get in trouble. Better to stay where she was until the man told her she could move.

  Then she saw a young officer grab hold of a corner of the fallen hive. He tried to drag it upward but seemed caught off-guard at the weight. The fool didn’t even have a protective suit to keep him safe.

  “Hey, no!” Alice called out, breaking position to run across toward him, waving her arms. “Don’t move it. Just leave it alone.”

  It took the young man a few seconds to realize she was shouting at him. When he did so, he dropped the edge of the hive he’d been lifting, and Alice winced as it thudded back down onto the ground.

  “You can’t move the hives,” she said, panting as she arrived at his side. “The bees are already agitated. If you shove their homes about, they’ll think they’re under attack and turn aggressive.”

  “Well, the sergeant ordered me to shift these out of the way. How’m I meant to do that?”

  Alice shook her head, appalled. “First off, you need at least a few months of training on bee-handling procedures. If you don’t have that, you shouldn’t be over here in the first place.”

  As if in emphasis, a small cloud of bees rose from the disturbed hive, buzzing loudly. The young officer backed away, eyes darting in all directions as the bees flew and swooped.

  “Just stay calm and walk away,” Alice instructed him. “They won’t hurt you if you don’t upset them.”

  “How am I meant to know what will upset them?” the officer said with a squeak. “I’m a city boy.”

  Alice snorted. That much was obvious. “No sudden movements. Tell your sergeant you won’t be able to move the hives.”

  The man continued to back away slowly, then, when out of range of the meandering bees, began to run.

  “What’s all this nonsense?” The same sergeant who Alice had already spoken to appeared back in front of her. His face was drawn in such a scowl that Alice could work out he wasn’t happy from yards away.

  “This officer was trying to move the hives, but I told him you won’t be able to.”

  “Why not?” The sergeant crossed his arms. “We need them out of the way. They’re impeding our ability to conduct a thorough scene examination.”

  “It’s daytime, for a start,” Alice said as though he’d know immediately what that meant for the request. His blank face told her he didn’t. “The forager bees will already be out and about, searching for pollen and nectar. If you move the hives too far, they’ll never be able to find their way home.”

  “While I sympathize, I’m not about to let a couple of bees dictate—”

  A short man called out to them, waving his hand to make sure he got the sergeant’s attention. “You need to come down here and take a look.”

  The man turned without waiting for an answer, and the sergeant sighed, then followed along. Unsure what she should do, Alice tagged along behind the two of them.

  A few yards away, the property descended on a downward slope to a river bank. Two women wore white protective suits, similar to Alice’s beekeeping outfit. The clothing raised a smile until she saw what they were standing by.

  A man lay sprawled on the ground, half-in, and half-out of the slow-moving river. His face was swollen and misshapen. Even from her distance away, Alice could see the markings of a series of bee-stings.

  “Oh, my,” she whispered, rapidly tapping her fingers against the back of her hand. “Oh, dear.”

  The sergeant moved close to the body, using a trail of stepping stones that had been set up near the scene to move nearer.

  “Well. What is it?” he asked the small man hovering behind him.

  “You can see the discoloration from bee-stings on the deceased’s face,” the man said in response, ducking around the side of the sergeant and moving in even closer to the body.

  Alice turned and fixed her eyes on the trees nearby, wanting something pretty to focus on to clear the horror of the scene away. The branches were so crammed full of blossom, they looked like bridesmaids dressed by the girliest bride in the world—all ruffles, bows, and laces.

  “If you can see inside the victim’s mouth, there’s telltale redness and swelling inside his mouth and throat as well. It appears he’s died from anaphylaxis.”

  What a terrible business. Alice tapped harder, scared to close her eyes in case the image of the dead man recurred in her memory. She stared at the burgeoning trees with such deep concentration her entire face creased into a frown.

  “Why would he run into beehives if he was allergic?” the sergeant asked.

  A silly question. Alice frowned. Obviously, the man wouldn’t.

  After a split-second pause, the short man agreed with her. “I think you must be looking at a murder. He didn’t wander into those hives by accident. They’re well signposted to prevent exactly that kind of situation. I believe the most likely scenario is somebody pushed him into the hives, wanting to trigger his allergic reaction.”

  “You mean, this is now officially a murder investigation?” The sergeant sounded a mix of excited and exhausted all at once. “We’re looking for a killer.”

  “This is just speculation at the moment,” the other man warned, “but yes. Unless I find a different cause of death during his autopsy, then I believe you’re looking at a murder.”

  Alice stepped back, feeling faint. Someone had used her bees as a weapon to slay that poor, dead man.

  Chapter Five

  “Hey, you,” the sergeant called out as Alice backed away, overwhelmed by a desire to be home and sitting on the porch with Chester.

  She didn’t respond to his cry, too intent on her need to get out of view of the body and sit down. Alice’s head felt like a floating cloud while her feet were leaden. If she keeled over in the middle of the section, she’d probably end up being the laughing stock of another news broadcast again.

  “Hold up,” the
sergeant called out, louder.

  He was now just a step or two away, but Alice couldn’t talk. She was desperate to find somewhere to recover. Being this close to a murder victim was making her dizzier by the second.

  The sergeant’s hand closed on her elbow, and Alice shrieked and pulled away. “Don’t touch me,” she yelled, raising her hands to her head and clamping down on her ears, squeezing her eyes shut. “I don’t like to be touched.”

  The sergeant held his hands up to either side, palms out to show he wouldn’t try it again. Alice backed away another step just to be sure. After a moment to recover, she slowly lowered her arms.

  “I need to sit down,” she explained. “I’m about to faint.”

  The ‘about-to,’ turned out to be optimistic as the world shriveled down to a pinhole of light. Alice’s body slid down to meet the hard ground, which felt as welcoming to her as a feather mattress.

  “Stand back,” where the first words Alice heard when she roused back into consciousness.

  The sergeant was standing beside her, shooing the curious onlookers away. The short man who’d pronounced her bees as the cause of the dead victim’s demise knelt beside her. Alice shrank away from his touch. In part, that was because of her usual phobia of people getting close but mostly because those same fingers had been prodding a dead body just moments before.

  “I’m okay,” she said, holding up her arm to ward him off. “I just need a minute.”

  Alice looked around her, confused by the jumble of sights and sounds. Everything seemed too bright, and every noise was pitched at full volume. She’d experienced melt-downs before when she was at high school, and the aftermath of those was much the same.

  Except this time, she wasn’t a bullied teenager trapped in the hellish existence of school. She was meant to be a grown-up, for goodness’ sake.

  The sergeant squatted down nearby, and to Alice’s relief, he heeded her earlier reprimand and kept his hands to himself. “What do you say, doc?” he asked the short man.

  “She’s fine. Just a normal response to times of stress. Her blood pressure dropped, so her brain turned off, making her fall down so her body could raise it up again.”

  Alice smiled at the words. She liked the idea of her body kicking in to demand what it needed, even if it had landed her flat on her back in a dew-damp field.

  “Just get up in stages,” the doctor warned. Given his presence at the scene, Alice guessed he was the pathologist. “You don’t want to stand up right away, or you’ll likely end up flat on your back again.”

  “Right.” The sergeant stood back up, his kneecaps popping like gunfire as they took his full weight. Alice smiled again. Her own knees had done the same for the past few years. Chester wasn’t the only one getting old.

  She sat up and shook her head to clear it of the fuzzy feeling. Around her, policemen got back to work, so the only people left staring were the reporters. Alice glared in their direction and was glad to see one of them turn away, ashamed. The others had thicker skins which she supposed was necessary, given their job.

  “Hey, don’t leave yet,” the sergeant called out as Alice slowly got to her feet. “I wouldn’t mind some more guidance about the bees, seeing as how they seem to be implicated.”

  Alice nodded, then stretched out her back until it, too, popped. “I can’t stay here too long,” she warned. “I have things to take care of back home.” In fact, it would be about six hours before the vet’s appointment—the only entry on her calendar—but that wasn’t his business.

  “Alice!” Sally’s voice called out from the sidewalk, full of concern. “What on earth have they been doing to you? Don’t say anything!”

  The sergeant raised his eyebrow and gave Alice another quick glance. “Friend of yours?”

  Alice nodded. “She’s my partner in the honey business. Is it okay if I go and see her?”

  “Of course.” The officer gave her a tiny bow and Alice walked over to where Sally was nervously shifting from foot to foot.

  “After I called you, it occurred to me you might come down here,” Sally said in a rush. “I should’ve thought more about it before running my mouth off.”

  Alice shook her head. “I would’ve picked up on the news, eventually.” She turned back to check the beehives. “Besides, I’m grateful you did. Some foolish PC was trying to move the hives as though they were empty boxes to be tossed out of the way!”

  Sally gave a nervous glance, then took a step back and looked Alice up and down with a more critical eye. “Goodness. You’re covered in dirt. What have you been up to?”

  “I fell over,” Alice said, not wanting the added concern about her health now that she felt fine again.

  “It’s such a terrible thing,” Sally mused. “Did you see anything when you were down here last night?”

  At that, the sergeant’s head swiveled back to Alice. His hearing must be just as sharp as her own.

  “I didn’t come down here,” she said hastily, blushing as the sergeant continued to look her way.

  “Are you sure?” Sally took a step back. “I thought you said you would. I know I cautioned against it, but usually, that just leads you to do the opposite.”

  The officer now walked back the few paces to stand by Alice’s side, and she babbled, “I had a job on. It was too late by the time I finished to come down here.”

  Again, Sally frowned, not seeming to realize the sergeant’s interest was because of her words. “Really? What job? You said you had nothing on for the rest of the day.”

  “Hm-hm.” The sergeant cleared his throat. “Are you telling me that not only do you look after the bees here but you were in the vicinity last night when the victim was likely killed?”

  Alice knew her blushing was making the matter worse. She knew her fainting probably made her look as guilty as sin. Still, she gave one last try. “I swear, I wasn’t here at all. I was at home.”

  “No, you weren’t.” Sally crossed her arms and looked confused and worried. “I tried phoning you all afternoon to see how the new recipes went, and you didn’t answer.”

  Alice was shaking as she opened her mouth again to explain, then the sergeant cut her off.

  “How about we take you down to the station and I’ll ask you some questions?” He cocked an eyebrow at her, but Alice knew it wasn’t really a request. “I can ask you about the bees on the property, and you can tell me all about what you were doing last night. What do you say?”

  Alice numbly nodded her assent, following along as the officer walked over to his police car and opened the door for her to climb into the back seat.

  Chapter Six

  There was a lump in Alice’s throat she found it hard to swallow around as she sat opposite the sergeant. The noise levels in the outer office of the station had been so high she wanted to block her ears, but in the interview room, it was the opposite. Alice strained to hear any extraneous noise. So much so, when the officer spoke, his voice boomed in her ears.

  “Can you tell me what would make bees attack a man?”

  Alice nodded eagerly, glad she could answer his question. All she wanted was to play ball and get out of here as soon as possible.

  “The bees give up their lives when they sting,” she explained. “They’re not like wasps which can attack again and again and get off Scott-free. If they sting you, the process tears them apart, so the only reason to do it is if someone or something threatens their lives or the life of their queen.”

  The sergeant nodded. “How would that happen?”

  “It could be a variety of different scenarios.” Alice warmed to her subject. “If something damages the hive, or an invader infiltrates past the guard bees, then the worker bees would die to defend her. The entire colony can act as one being when they need to. It’s not a case of every bee for themselves—all bees work for the greater good. They’d willingly sacrifice their lives to ensure the colony survived.”

  “So, if a man—or woman—pushed over the hives, the b
ees would feel sufficiently threatened to sting?”

  “Oh, yes.” Alice nodded emphatically, bouncing up and down on the hard chair. “Whoever pushed those hives over definitely earned themselves an onslaught of bee-stings. I’m not surprised the man’s face was as swollen as it was.”

  “When did you see the victim? Was that last night?”

  The sergeant sat back in his chair, and Alice felt the mood in the room switch. She didn’t understand the undercurrents of emotion in the same way as a neurotypical, but that didn’t mean she was immune to sensing the change.

  “I didn’t visit the property last night.” When the man seemed about to interrupt, Alice continued in a hurry to get the words out. “I was going to, probably, I hadn’t quite decided, but then I got a call from the school and the principal was afraid a swarm would attack the children, and it was Sunday, and that meant today would be Monday and the kids would be in class, so I had to go around immediately. I ended up getting a small hive of bees out of it, but it took some time. They’d gathered together on a poplar tree branch in the back of the playground, but I had to coax them into a little box. It’s easier than it sounds, but it still takes a lot of time, even if you know what you’re doing, and I do. I do know what I’m doing. That’s why the society recommended the principal call me. His name is Alex Dunbar. You can check with him. I’m not lying.”

  The words toppled out at such a rate the sergeant ended up looking quite bewildered. Alice bit the inside of her cheek and willed her mouth to keep closed.

  The sergeant’s expression was one of the few she understood, having seen it far too often during her lifetime. She’d shared too much, too soon, about something he didn’t care about. At least she wasn’t trying to make friends with him—if the man dismissed her, it would be a relief rather than a slight.

  “Okay, just give me a minute to work through all of that.” The sergeant raised a hand to rub at his eyebrow and Alice mimicked the gesture. That’s what you did if you wanted people to like you. She’d been taught that so long ago the habit was ingrained.