CHAPTER 1
Terror By Email

Lisa Gibes stood frozen to the floor, unable to move. Her mind refused to accept the message that her eyes were sending to her brain. She stared blankly at the crumpled figure slouched in the chair behind the gleaming mahogany desk. Only minutes before she had been standing beside the desk making polite conversation with her boss while she placed the morning mail on his desk. As she left his office, the quiet was shattered by a loud explosion. She felt the blast of hot air hit her back and spun around to see what had happened. The letters were scattered around the desk, no longer in the neat pile where she had placed them, and now they were covered in blood.

On the desk in front of Bill Massey were the remains of the parcel that had been delivered by courier earlier that morning. Massey had been reaching for it as she moved away from his desk.

He wouldn't reach for anything again. Ever!

Lisa started to shiver. Her mind refused to accept the scene of horror. She screamed, her hands flying up to cover her mouth. She was too late. Her next scream was muffled by the warm spray of vomit that jetted from her mouth and dribbled down the front of her dress. She burst into tears. The shock reached her legs and they collapsed under her, tumbling her to the floor.

Her screams echoed around the busy office, sending shock waves through the ancient wood-paneled corridors. The other lawyers and their assistants stopped in their tracks, but only for a moment.

Bill Massey's partner, Geoff Ward was the first to reach the door to the office of his friend and business partner. He almost fell over Lisa's prone figure. As he bent to help her up, his eyes captured the scene of carnage. He reached out, trying to close the door to keep the other people from entering. He was too late.

"Get the police," he gasped.

"What about an ambulance?" another secretary asked, her voice shaking with fear.

"Yes, and for God's sake hurry."

The young woman rushed from the room into the reception office and grabbed the telephone. She babbled an incoherent message to the emergency operator, but at least it brought immediate action when she sputtered the words "dead," "ambulance," and "murder."

The ambulance arrived in less than five minutes. The officer took one look at Massey, then turned his attention to Lisa, who still lay where she had collapsed on the floor. He asked one of the other secretaries to take her out and find a couch for her to lie on. He wanted her out of the office. He didn't need another screaming fit when she came to. She was already suffering from shock; another one so soon after the first would not do her mental state any good.

There was nothing he could do for Massey–or what was left of him. The shattered parcel lying on the desk in front of him must have contained a large amount of explosive to have done so much damage. Both his hands had been blown off, there was a gaping hole in his chest and his face was a bloody pulp. He was not a pretty sight, but then traumatic deaths never were.

"At least he wouldn't have known what hit him," the ambulance driver muttered, turning to the police inspector who had just entered the room.

Inspector Webster nodded grimly as he stood looking around the office. The force of the explosion had driven the chair backward into wall. It hadn't had far to travel, but the dent in the plaster wall was silent testimony to the force the explosion had generated. The parcel had disintegrated. There would be little left for forensic to work on. Just his luck to walk in on a case such as this on his first day back from holidays.

While his men sorted through the rubble, he went to speak with the people gathered in the staff tea room. Geoff Ward had hung a quickly scribbled sign in the entrance foyer apologizing to the public and telling them the office would be closed for the rest of the day, then locked the doors. He was sure the police wouldn't want the public wandering through the building while they were pursuing their enquires, especially if any of the public were from the media.

Inspector Webster looked around the people gathered in the tea room. They were huddled in small groups around the lunch tables. The tea lady had not yet reported in, but one of the secretaries had turned on the Zip and was handing out cups of tea and coffee. Webster was glad she had shown such initiative; it would help to relax the staff. It was not every day you had your senior partner murdered in his office.

"Anybody know anything about the parcel?" he asked.

"It arrived as I was sorting out Mr. Massey's morning mail," the receptionist muttered. "It was addressed to him and marked Personal, so I didn't open it but gave it to Lisa."

"Just as well," Webster said softly.

"Oh, my God," she muttered as realization dawned. "If I had opened it, it would have blown me to pieces."

Copyright © 2003 by Alan M. Brooker