Digging Deeper Read online

  Table of Contents

  Legal Page

  Title Page

  Book Description

  Dedication

  Trademarks

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  More from Bellora & Sadie

  About the Authors

  Publisher

  Digging Deeper

  ISBN #978-1-78651-687-9

  ©Copyright Bellora Quinn and Sadie Rose Bermingham 2018

  Cover Art by Cherith Vaughn ©Copyright August 2018

  Edited by Rebecca Scott

  Pride Publishing

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Pride Publishing.

  Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Pride Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

  The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

  Published in 2018 by Pride Publishing, Think Tank, Ruston Way, Lincoln, LN6 7FL, UK

  Pride Publishing is a subsidiary of Totally Entwined Group Limited.

  Elemental Evidence

  DIGGING DEEPER

  Bellora Quinn &

  Sadie Rose Bermingham

  Book four in the Elemental Evidence series

  Unearthing the past brings them closer together…and to danger.

  A maniac is on the loose in London, drugging young women and assaulting them before burying them in shallow graves.

  When Inspector John Cordiline asks Jake Chivis for his unique assistance as a Fire Elemental with the Cemetery Rapist case, he feels he can hardly refuse. What begins as a simple job—trying to get memories from a suspect to aid conviction—soon takes a darker turn when one of the victims dies and an offer of help comes from an unexpected and unwelcome source.

  Dr. Mari Gale is disturbed to find that his former lover Tomas Arregui is in London and wants to meet with him. Despite his best efforts to avoid the man, fate seems to be pushing him onto a collision course with Tomas. And the impact will cast him into more trouble than he could ever have imagined.

  Digging deeper for the truth could be the death of them.

  Dedication

  Over the last few years, there have been many people to thank for their help and support in the writing of this series. We are overwhelmed with gratitude toward our families, our friends and our lovely readers, who have given boundless encouragement and advice and cheered us along the way. Elemental Evidence is now at volume four, and while we once naively imagined that this book would mark the end of the series, we now know there are still more adventures to write for Jake and Mari. Their stories are not yet complete. So, as we continue to document their journey, there remains one person we must yet thank for her amazing work. Our wonderful editor, Rebecca Scott, has been a teacher and motivator, who has supported Elemental Evidence from the start. Thank you, Rebecca, for your keen eye, great sense of humor and unfailing enthusiasm for our boys. You’re the best.

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Inspector Gadget: DHX Media Limited

  Paul Smith: Paul Smith Group Holdings Limited

  The London Underground: London Underground Limited

  Sherlock Holmes: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

  Night of the Living Dead: The Walter Reade Organization and Continental Distributing

  Alexander McQueen: AutumnPaper Limited

  Armani: Giorgio Armani S.p.A.

  Tonto: Classic Media LLC

  Doctor Death: Bob Kane, D.C. Comics

  Cheshire Cat: Disney Enterprises Inc.

  Hoover: Hoover Company

  Waterstones: Waterstones Booksellers Limited

  British Library: The British Library Board

  Dustbuster: Black & Decker Corporation

  London Evening Standard: Alexander Lebedev, Evgeny Lebedev, Geordie Greig, Daily Mail and General Trust, Justin Byam Shaw

  Cherry Coke: Coca-Cola Company

  Disney: Disney Enterprises Inc.

  VW Passat: Volkswagen Inc.

  Range Rover: Jaguar Land Rover Limited

  Android: Google LLC

  Prologue

  Tamara opened her eyes to total darkness. A black so profound that, even after blinking several times, she could still see nothing. There was no sound beyond the dull thump of her heartbeat and, most alarming of all, she couldn’t do more than wiggle her fingers and toes. Her breath seemed to bounce right back in her face. There had to be something solid mere inches in front of her but it was like she was in a straitjacket. She couldn’t lift her arms to feel it. Her head was throbbing and she began to panic.

  Another, harder effort to move her arms got them to shift against the pressure holding her down. Crumbs of something warm and soft fell between her fingers. The weight on her arms and lower body was more than just her own groggy inertia—there was real, physical pressure. She whimpered and struggled in earnest, getting her arms and legs to move incrementally, and more soft, damp crumbs tumbled around her in the stifling, pitch blackness.

  I’m underground! My god, I’m underground!

  The thought was enough to spike panic in her chest and her heart drummed louder. She kept wiggling and shifting, forcing her fingers into claws and scrabbling them upward. The dirt was loose and gave way, but that didn’t make the absolute terror coursing through her abate. Lifting her head, she hit something, about three inches above her nose. It was curved and solid, extending down toward her chest, and she could feel the roughness brushing her nipples when she tried to push herself upward again. Was she naked? How had that happened? Had the house collapsed on her in her sleep?

  Disturbingly, she could not remember anything leading up to this moment. Her last clear recall was of leaving work, heading off to meet with a few mates for a drink before going home. Nothing special, not the kind of bender that would have wiped out her memories of going home afterward.

  How long had she been like this? She tried to force the panic down, some shred of logic asserting that she would use up what little oxygen she had if she continued panting. She couldn’t help it, though. Her mind kept screaming that she couldn’t move, couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe!

  In addition to clawing at the damp earth, she moved her legs, pushing up and trying to bend her knees, even shifting her hips up and down, all in an attempt to make the dirt sifting around he
r pack down under her body and give her increased space. It was working, inch by inch. She was getting room to move, even as more and more soil shifted over her like a dry cascade. She just needed to keep on wiggling. By doing that, she might get free. If she was buried shallow enough.

  If she was several feet under, though… No, she would not think of that. She had to keep the panic at bay.

  Shift, shift, wiggle, wiggle.

  She had almost made enough room for her hands to dig.

  How could this have happened? How had she gotten here?

  Tamara struggled to recall her last memory again. Calling in at the pub for a pint of cider after work, a quick laugh with friends, then…nothing. She didn’t remember talking to anyone or going home.

  Shift, wiggle, shift, wiggle.

  She had enough room to bend her elbows and knees. All she could do was keep at it, keep going, keep swallowing the panic every time it threatened to engulf her. Tears stung her eyes. What if she was buried so deep it was all useless? It didn’t matter. She couldn’t just lie there and accept her fate. She would keep going until she was either free or she ran out of air.

  Shift, wiggle, dig, shift, wiggle, dig.

  She was getting handfuls of dirt. It was easier to move. Tamara kept going, clawing faster. Without warning, her fingers met no resistance. Her hand was free. Cooler air swirled over her exposed skin and she thrust upward, forcing her arm higher, tearing at the ground until her other hand joined it. Breathing was harder. The air that fanned her face didn’t ease the burning in her lungs. With both hands, she raked at the ground and at last her fingers touched the rough wooden arch covering her face and part of her torso. She shoved at it as she sat up and sweet air rushed into her starved lungs.

  Tamara sobbed with relief and spit dirt that had fallen from her hair out of her mouth.

  “What the fuck?” a man’s voice demanded. “Oh my lord. Oh my god. Are you all right?”

  She had no idea if she was all right or ever would be again. Someone bent over her, trying to help her up, and she panicked, conscious of the cold air on her skin. Tamara screamed.

  “Don’t touch me! Get away from me!”

  A flashlight beam cut through the misty gray of early morning and a small dog yapped like a mad thing as it ran around in circles.

  “Stop! What are you doing there?” That was a different voice. She recognized the dark navy uniform and the high-viz vest of a police officer beyond the bobbing torchlight.

  “Help me! Help me, please!” Tamara screamed. The man who had his hands on her backed off at once and Tamara had never been so glad to see a police officer in her life. The uniformed figure hurried up to them and pointed a finger at the man.

  “Keep your hands where I can see them!”

  “I wasn’t doing anything!” the man protested at once, sounding like he might burst into tears. “I was trying to help her.”

  Tamara sobbed and crossed her arms over her body, trying to cover herself. The dog was still yapping away like it was demented. She wished it would shut up. It was making her headache worse.

  “I don’t know how I got here. I was buried under the ground.”

  “It’s all right, love. I’ll call for an ambulance.” The copper radiated calm. He knelt and put his waterproof jacket around her shoulders, looking up. “You!” He pointed at the man again. “Put your hands on your head and turn around.”

  Chapter One

  “Mama, you’ve not forgotten what happened in Paris, have you?”

  Dr. Annabel Gale was busy making scrambled eggs, while her sole offspring perched on a stool at the edge of the island unit in their open-plan kitchen and perused the documents from her oncologist she had given him to read. The twenty-four-hour news channel burbled away in the background. On the TV screen, police tape surrounded an incident somewhere in Highgate, but there were many incidents in London, so many that they failed to raise an eyebrow most of the time. She did not look up at him but a smile tugged at her lips. Her son, Ilmarinen—named in honor of her Finnish ancestors, for an ancient Suomi wind deity, and resentful of that fact since childhood—loved to find fault with the many and various consultants she selected in the battle to fix her allegedly incurable ailment. It did not stop her reaching out to anyone she believed might have a cure.

  Anni was not a fantasist. A competent medic and a specialist in tropical medicine, she knew that the cancer in her blood stood a high chance of beating her. Until it did, though, she was going to find new and interesting ways of fighting it. The experiments all made for good research papers, if nothing else.

  “You know as well as I do, when you have seen as many specialists as I have, there is an outside chance that one of them at least will be…” She paused to consider her words.

  “Bogus,” Mari filled in, without looking up from the glossy brochure in his hands.

  “Don’t be childish,” she admonished.

  “I’m not being childish. Monsieur Colbert was a fraud, plain and simple. He’d have milked you dry, if you’d been more gullible. And you’d still be sick.” Mari raised his head, staring at her with open defiance over the résumé in his hands. He had her sharp blue eyes, the family genes inherited from her father and his mother before them.

  “I thank you for acknowledging that I’m not in my dotage yet.” She exhaled. “Do you want breakfast or should I just give it to Tonka?”

  Her elderly Staffordshire terrier pricked his ragged ears and lifted his brindle nose off his neat, white forepaws at the mention of his name. His whipcord tail wagged once or twice in momentary enthusiasm.

  Mari set the booklet aside and beamed at her across the island that separated their cooking and living spaces in the rear of the house. French windows in the lounge area looked out over a rare square of green space behind their neat, white-painted Georgian terrace, filling the room with light and what passed for fresh air in the capital. Tonka settled down in his dog bed by the windows, having satisfied himself that neither food nor walkies were seriously on offer, while Anni spooned eggs onto a plate. She pushed it across the counter toward her son, watching him with maternal tenderness as he helped himself to crisp wholemeal toast and devoured it with the appetite of a man twice his size. He was tall, like her estranged husband Troy, and her father, but she worried that he was too thin for a man approaching thirty, even if he did burn off excess calories with his daily runs in the park. At least he had a boyfriend now. His solitary status had been another of her concerns since his return to London.

  “No Jake this morning?” she asked, keeping her tone casual as she ground a scattering of fresh black pepper over her eggs.

  He glanced at her with narrowed eyes and a warning frown. “Clearly not.”

  “There’s no need for snark. It was just a question. You’re still being nice to him, aren’t you?”

  “Mama, he doesn’t belong to me. Jake has his own life, you know.”

  “I do know.” She turned away to hide a tiny grin, all the same. If there was a problem, she would be able to see it. Mari was hopeless at hiding his emotions around her. At the moment he was frustrated but not despondent, and she was content. A little teasing was good for him. It prevented him getting too serious and self-absorbed.

  Mari put another forkful of food in his mouth likely so he didn’t have to talk. For a few minutes they continued to eat in companionable silence, but as her son put his utensils down on the empty plate in front of him, his expression was solemn again.

  “What?” she asked, aware that there was a question coming.

  “You trust this one?” He nodded toward the brochure.

  “She seems reliable. I looked into the testimonies of her previous clients and they all check out. She’s an Elemental, Ilmari. I thought that would appeal to you.” Annabel took a last mouthful of breakfast and tapped the side of her coffee glass with her fork as she chewed and swallowed. She knew Mari was still watching her as she took her tablets with the last few gulps of strong, dark Italian c
offee. He could be possessive and sometimes a tad controlling—a trait he got from Troy—but she didn’t love him any less for it.

  “She’s a bloody faith healer,” Mari said with a huff of dismissal, which also uncomfortably reminded her of her ex.

  “No one understands what you do either. Does it make your gift less genuine?” Annabel shook her head. “I realize you feel the need to protect me, though, for all my days, I have no idea from what, but let me try this. If she can do what she professes she can, it might well be the key to our wildest dreams. What’s the worst that could happen?”

  “She turns out to be another charlatan and we’re a quarter of a million pounds in the red for nothing,” Mari replied succinctly.

  “That’s my decision to make,” Annabel told him. “You promised to support me when you came home from Barcelona. If you don’t want to do that anymore, you could always move in with Jake.”

  She saw him open his mouth and waited for him to remind her that, technically, the house was his, transferred to him by her mother during the springtime, when they’d both been worried about her health, and on the condition that he didn’t abandon her. Annabel Gale was still annoyed about that.

  To her surprise, he made a thin line of his lips again without saying a word. That was so uncharacteristic that she wanted to find reasons for it.

  “Everything is okay with you and Jake, isn’t it?”

  He uttered a breathless laugh. “Mama, we spent one night apart in the last fifteen. I haven’t offended him. He’s not left me for a newer model. We’re good. He had an early start yesterday and I had work to do last night. That’s all.”

  “I’m glad to hear it.” She sighed, collecting up the breakfast plates.

  “I’ll do those,” he said in a curt tone, rising and taking them from her. “You seriously believe this healer can help you?”