Judy's Death (Cara Daniels Cozy Mystery Book 2) (5 page)

Chapter 10

Cara raced out of the room and up the
stone steps. She could hear two voices, one of them was shouting - Andrew James
Moss.

He yelled, “Judy, I’m sorry! You can’t
tell anyone! It’s taken me so long to get this far! I can’t let you ruin my
reputation.”

Judy said, “Andrew, it’s okay! I
understand, please calm down.”

“No one can know what I’ve done! Ever!”

As Cara rounded the corner towards the
last flight of stairs she saw Andrew James Moss thrust his hands out towards
Judy who was standing on the top step. Judy’s arms flailed as she tried to get
her balance. Cara sped forward, already knowing that it was too late.

Judy screamed as she began to fall
backwards. Cara leapt forward and held her arms out in the hope of somehow
catching Judy. Cara’s breath was knocked out of her as Judy collided into her.
Together, they headed towards the stone steps.

Cara felt a whoosh of air beneath her
and time seemed to slow down as she landed softly on the steps. Judy landed
gently at her side. Cara blinked, it was as if they’d landed on a pile of
feathers. She looked down and saw that Robin was lying on the steps beneath
them, his huge wings open. He’d caught both of them. He grinned at Cara and
said, “That was close!”

Andrew let out a roar of horror as he
ran down the steps. “Judy! Judy! What have I done? Are you okay?” He burst into
tears and covered his face with his hands. “How could I do that? To you? What
an idiot! Oh!”

Judy pulled herself into a sitting
position. She looked at Cara and said in a hushed tone, “I think you just saved
my life! Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”

Cara shook her head. “I’m fine.” The
black death line around Judy had gone. Cara felt relief wash over her. She repeated,
“Judy, I’m fine, and so are you.”

Chapter 11

Later that evening Cara sat across from
Robin in her living room. He shook his head, laughed, and shook his head again.
“That was so exciting! Can you believe we got there in time? Can you believe we
saved Judy’s life?”

Cara didn’t share his enthusiasm.
“Robin, we nearly didn’t. Another second and Judy would have hit her head on
those stone steps and most likely have died.”

Robin’s smile faded. “I know. I’m
sorry. I’ve got all these new emotions to deal with, I’m not sure how to act.
How did you know that Andrew was going to kill her?”

“He’s been using her stories and
passing them off as his own. He added bits in to make them erotic reads but he
kept the storyline, and even the names were similar. His first book was exactly
like the manuscript of Judy’s that I read last night. I didn’t realise until I
flicked through his book again. And Judy told me about the other stories she’d
written, the ones that she’s only shared with her writing group, which includes
Andrew. He stole them and published them as his own. Judy must have realised
what he’d done when she listened to his reading. She must have confronted him.”
She shook her head. “I can’t believe he pushed her down the stairs.”

Robin nodded. “He’s full of remorse
now. You saved his soul.”

“I don’t care about his soul, I care
about Judy. I wonder if she’s going to tell the police what he’s done. I’m glad
Thomas came to see her, he can look after her. Maybe I should ring Judy.”

Robin held up a hand. “You have to
leave them alone. You’ve done what you had to. Judy will contact you if she
feels the need.”

Cara sighed. “I wasn’t expecting this
to be so difficult.”

“Neither was I,” Robin admitted. “I was
pretty useless, wasn’t I? I’ll never be as good as Edward, he wouldn’t have
disappeared because he was overcome with sadness.”

Cara smiled. “I’ll never be as good as
Gran. But we can try, can’t we?”

Robin jumped up. “Oh! I’ve just
remembered! My feather! You get one of my feathers.” He opened his arms and his
wings appeared. A solitary feather floated away from his wing and towards Cara.
She caught it and pulled it to her chest. Robin laughed as the missing white
feather was replaced by a silver one. “My first silver feather! Awesome!”

Cara looked at the white feather that
was hers to keep. It would always remind her of Judy.

Robin said, “You should be proud of
yourself, you saved Judy’s life.”

Cara nodded. “With your help.”

Robin clapped his hands together and
said, “Right! Let’s get on with the next job!”

A note from the author

I’ve been writing murder mysteries for
a few years now. I recently got the idea that I wanted to write stories about
someone stopping murders from occurring in the first place. I realised that
person would need some sort of paranormal/supernatural help to let her know
when the possible murders would occur and I came up with angels. That got me
thinking: if you knew someone was going to be murdered soon, what would you do
to stop it?

Read Cara’s other stories, you can find
details of them on my website :

www.gillianlarkin.co.uk

If you sign up to my newsletter through
my website you will receive 3 short stories in pdf form as a thank you gift.

You can contact me on :
[email protected]

Best wishes

Gillian

A CARA DANIELS COZY MYSTERY

JUDY
’
S DEATH

GILLIAN LARKIN

www.gillianlarkin.co.uk

Front cover images by Vectorstock.com

without permission from the author.