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Back Dead in Devon Save as PDF
Chapters (51)
  1. Cover
  2. Dead in Devon
  3. DEDICATION
  4. CONTENTS
  5. AUTHOR’S NOTE
  6. PROLOGUE
  7. CHAPTER ONE
  8. CHAPTER TWO
  9. CHAPTER THREE
  10. CHAPTER FOUR
  11. CHAPTER FIVE
  12. CHAPTER SIX
  13. CHAPTER SEVEN
  14. CHAPTER EIGHT
  15. CHAPTER NINE
  16. CHAPTER TEN
  17. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  18. CHAPTER TWELVE
  19. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  20. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  21. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  22. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  23. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  24. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  25. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  34. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  35. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  36. CHAPTER THIRTY
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  42. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  44. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  45. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  46. CHAPTER FORTY
  47. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  48. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  49. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  50. By Stephanie Austin
  51. COPYRIGHT

Bill was sleeping in my chair when I got in the living room. As I swung my bag down from my shoulder, I heard Adam calling him downstairs. ‘Sounds like your dinner time too,’ I told him, scooping him up. ‘You’d better go.’

By the time I opened the door, Adam was already standing outside it. ‘Get your own cat, Juno,’ he told me, taking a struggling Bill from my arms.

‘My landlord won’t let me.’

He nodded sadly. ‘It must be tough.’ Bill was wriggling in his grasp and he tucked him firmly under one arm and marched him downstairs.

The curry was worth the wait. After I’d eaten, I opened up my laptop in the vague hope that the hub might be working. The witterings on social media only serve to convince me that I’m living in the wrong century. I think the Middle Ages might have suited me better; I’m sure I could have coped with warfare, plague and pestilence better than the irritations of modern life. I scribbled belated happy birthdays on a couple of timelines, cooed dutifully over the latest baby pictures, and reminded a friend, who complained that I’m permanently unreachable because of Ashburton’s erratic mobile signal, that I do still have a landline. All of my old friends from school or university seemed to be either having babies or living in vibrant cities, pursuing dazzling careers. I’m doing neither. Well, good luck to ’em. I care not, I like it where I am.

There was an email from my only surviving relative, my cousin Brian, a diplomat in South Korea, asking if I was still looking after other people’s grannies and other people’s pets and if I was OK for money. It was great to hear from him. I emailed back that I was fine.

Of course this was a lie. I’ve never got enough money. I know I only have to ask but I won’t take advantage of Brian’s generosity unless the wolf has got through the door and is actually sinking its fangs into my thigh.

I hauled myself off to bed; we dog-walkers have to get up early. Before I switched the light out, I consulted my diary for the next day. Owing to the haphazard way my business has developed I see some of my clients once a week, others once a fortnight, a few once a month and the rest only when they feel like it. Without my diary, I am lost. Tomorrow promised something new, it promised a meeting with Ashburton’s master criminal: it promised Mr Nickolai.

CHAPTER THREE