that Dominic wasn’t just tanned, muscly and heroically square-jawed, he was also extremely good-looking. In a slightly obvious way of course, Richard found himself adding as an afterthought in his head.
Dominic next turned his attention to Fidel and considered the air that encompassed him.
‘As for you, you’re blues and greens … of kindness … valour. Hard work. Hey, you’re one of the good guys.’
Fidel blushed. He was clearly just as thrilled with his ‘reading’ as Camille had been with hers.
‘Oh for heaven’s sakes!’ Richard said. ‘Thank you, Mr De Vere, but I can see that people are congregated over there’—Richard pointed at the Meditation Space as it sat some way away on the lawn—’and I want to make this clear: my colleagues and I are going over to the crime scene right now, and you’re going to stay right here.’
‘But what about me?’ Dwayne said, eager as a puppy dog. ‘What’s my aura?’
Richard huffed in indignation as Dominic turned to Dwayne and took his time to consider. But then a knowing smile slipped onto Dominic’s lips.
‘You’re like me. A shape-shifter.’
Dwayne beamed at what he perceived to be the highest of compliments.
‘I knew it.’
Dominic turned back to Richard. ‘But I’m telling you, when I look at you, I don’t see … anything.’
‘Whereas I see a murder scene over there, so thank you very much for your help. Team, you’re with me, but if you try to move even an inch’—Richard said this to Dominic—’I’m going to arrest you for wasting police time.’
Richard strode off across the lawn, his team trying not to catch each other’s eyes as they got into their boss’s slipstream. After all, it wouldn’t do to turn up at a murder scene giggling.
But then, there was no chance of Richard or his team laughing by the time they arrived at the Meditation Space, where they found six shell-shocked Brits sitting or standing on the grass. Five of them were wearing white cotton robes that were variously spattered in drying blood. The sixth of them—Rianka—was sitting on the grass on her own. She was wearing a long Indian-style skirt with little mirrors sewn into the hemline, a light summer blouse, and leather sandals.
‘Okay, my name’s Detective Inspector Richard Poole,’ Richard said. ‘And this is Detective Sergeant Camille Bordey. Can any of you tell me what happened?’
‘That’s simple,’ said a well-tanned man in his fifties with a Yorkshire accent, a thick gold chain just visible around his neck. Richard also had time to notice a chunky gold watch on the man’s wrist. Clearly he was seriously wealthy.
‘The name’s Ben Jenkins,’ the man said. ‘And you should know, that woman over there, she says her name’s Julia Higgins. And she’s admitted it all. She killed Aslan Kennedy.’
Richard could see that Ben was pointing at a young woman in a bloodied white robe who was standing on her own on the grass. She was in her early twenties, had long blonde hair that was tied up in a ponytail, and she was looking back at Richard with doe eyes, seemingly as dismayed by the accusation as everyone else. But she wasn’t denying it, either, Richard noted.
With a quick nod of his head, Richard indicated that Dwayne should ghost over to Julia and make sure she didn’t make a run for it. As Dwayne started to move, Richard turned back to Ben.
‘And where’s the body?’
‘In there.’ Ben pointed at the Meditation Space.
Richard turned to the group. ‘Then if you’d all just wait here, please. The Detective Sergeant and I will only be a moment. Camille?’
Richard headed over to the Meditation Space, Camille coming over to join him, but Richard found himself stopping at the threshold to the building.
‘One moment,’ Richard said as he held his hand up for Camille to pause, because it was only now as Richard approached that he saw that the walls to the building were made of paper. In fact, as he looked closer, he could see that the paper was waxy, clearly very strong, and was even somewhat translucent. Richard put his hand on the other side of the door and noticed that he could still dimly see his hand’s shape through the paper.
‘What are you doing?’ Camille asked.
Richard ignored Camille as he took a moment to inspect the door to the building. He saw that there was no handle on the outside, but there was a Yale-style latch lock on the inside of the door that was screwed deep into the wooden frame—and that there was a corresponding housing on the door frame that it slotted into when the room was locked.
But without a keyhole on the outside, it appeared as though the door could only be locked and unlocked from the inside. Richard filed this information away for later consideration.
Stepping into the room, Richard immediately understood why the walls and roof were made of translucent paper, because every inch of the walls glowed with brilliant sunshine. And not only was it brighter inside the room than it was outside, it was significantly hotter too, like being at the heart of a supernova. Which was just bloody typical, Richard thought to himself.
Camille joined Richard inside and looked at her boss as he prickled in his suit.
‘Hot, isn’t it?’ she said, helpfully.
Richard decided to ignore his partner and instead, squinting against the light, saw that the body of a man lay sticky with blood in the middle of the floor. His hair, beard and white robes were now thick with blood. And there was a bloody knife on the floor by the body.
Richard gave the room a quick once-over, but there wasn’t much to see. The floor was polished hardwood planks; there were six woven prayer mats arranged in a circle around a tray of tea things. Six pairs of fabric eye masks and six wireless headphones were also lying here and there, but other than that the room was empty. No furniture—no cupboards, tables, chairs, statues or other ornaments—to hide behind or conceal murder weapons in.
To all intents and purposes the room was entirely bare.
Richard bent down and picked up one of the wireless headsets. He put it to his ear and frowned.
‘What is it?’ Camille asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Richard said, listening, but unable to work out what the noise was.
It was a strange keening.
He listened a bit longer, but, as far as he could tell, it was just more of the same yawling noise. And then dread filled his heart as he realised what it was.
With a shudder, he said, ‘It’s whales singing.’
Richard lowered the headphones, sharpish, and put them back down on the floor, before he joined Camille at the centre of the room to inspect the victim.
Crouching down, Richard could see that the murder weapon to the side of the body was a carving knife of some sort. Utterly vicious. The blade was covered in blood, although the handle seemed to be clean.
‘We’re going to need to get this bagged
