Barbara Bayes - The Serial Thief

THE SERIAL THIEF

Barbara Bayes

Copyright 2021

Copyright

This book is entirely a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogue are drawn from the authors imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

The Serial Thief Copyright 2021 by Barbara Bayes. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the author or her assigns.

Cover Photo by Thibault Debaene on Unsplash

Cover Design by Barbara Bayes 2021

Table of Contents

Prologue

The orderly found her as he had found so many. Death was never a surprise in a place like this. Most residents were in their eighties or nineties and so it was almost a daily occurrence. He could always tell with just a single glance when the life had left a bodyno need to search for the telltale rise and fall of the chest or reach for a wrist to press for a pulse. He could tell the moment he entered the room, recognize it even from the corner of his eye without the confirmation of a full-on glance. It was all about the pallor; the strange grey/blue cast that would settle upon the skin like a fine gossamer shroud. He had become very good at discerning deathit was familiar.

What wasnt familiar was what he saw just six feet away. The woman sat, perched and unmoving on the side of her own bed, staring at the corpse with a slight smile on her face. Even with his entry, the chilling smile didnt falter. He could tell that she too recognized death and that, in this case, it gave her great satisfaction. Her features looked softer than ever before; a faint unfamiliar blush to her cheeks taking twenty years off her age. That was when he noticed the pillow. The dead womans pillow. It was not where it should have been, but lay on the floor beside the bed.

* * *

What are you saying? Are you trying to tell me she was murdered ?

Lily almost laughed out loud at the suggestion. It was too ridiculous. Shed been director of Bloomville Terrace for nearly a decade and while it was true that over the years theyd dealt with a few incidents, they were diligent about monitoring their residents. From time to time, the odd resident had become violent; lashing out and hitting or spitting or pushing, usually the result of the initial stages of age-related dementia, but if someone showed any more disturbing behaviour than that, theyd be quickly whisked away to the units companion facility where stringent safety protocols were in place to deal with violent or abusive behaviour. The idea of a murder of the kind they were suggesting taking place at Bloomville was ludicrous.

Youre absolutely positive? Murdered ? she repeated the question, hoping that by tone she could communicate her incredulity and even push him to admit to an alternative theory, however far-fetched it might seem.

The police detective sitting across from her answered her in the slow and deliberate manner usually reserved for reasoning with a child. Lily could sense his rising impatience but didnt care. She needed to know that they were absolutely certain.

It appears so. According to the pathologist the signs of asphyxia were unmistakable. She was suffocated. Probably with the pillow the orderly noticed on the floor beside her bed.

Lily leaned back in her chair and sighed. Talk about bad luck. In every way it couldnt have come at a worse time. Bloomville was due for a government review in less than a week, the inspector slotted in for first thing Monday morning. There had already been some talk that funding might be cut, even that the facility might be closed down because of the age of the building. With a crumbling edifice and recurring black mould problem, remediation would have cost a fortune and it was money that the government just didnt have. This incident, if it was murder, would probably be the fatal blow.

Had it been something a little less serious, something that could be hidden from the powers that be, she would have done what she needed to do. Like that incident, only a month earlier, when theyd discovered that one of the orderlies had been stealing drugs from the infirmary. Shed managed to nip that one in the bud, firing him immediately and hushing the whole thing up before anyone ever found out. Unfortunately, murder just wasnt the sort of thing that one could keep quiet. Murder was a game changer.

That meant it looked like shed be out there once again, scrambling to find a new job. Lily couldnt suppress a second audible sigh as she contemplated the future. As hard as it had been to get her current position, things were sure to be even more difficult the next time around. There were so many online complaints about the facility, posted by the families of residents who were blaming her personally for the dismal conditions and terrible food. Venting their rage, secure in their anonymity, they often named her specifically in their posts. The director of this place should be shot . Lily, the woman in charge, ignored my complaints . The food is terrible, the halls and rooms are filthymanager Lily Sumner should be fired .

This was not the sort of online presence that one hoped for. Not the sort of fifteen minutes of fame that would inspire a new employer. Why couldnt the families see that it wasnt her fault? She was just a hireling, doing the best that she could do with the hand shed been dealt. If they only knew the lengths she went to on a daily basis to stretch the tiny budget shed been given.

Im sorry to harp on this Detective but isnt it possible that there was some other cause that looks similar? That she just somehow did it to herself by, oh, I dont know, lying down in the wrong position then not having the strength to move herself? Im sure it could happen. I once knew a man who broke a hip just by sitting down in a hard chair, she tried this one last ditch Hail Mary in the hopes of finding an alternative solution.

The detective just looked at her and tiredly shook his head, making it impossible for her to harbour any further hope.

Well then, Lily pushed herself away from her desk and stood, finally resigned to the news shed been given and accepting that this was to be the beginning of the end. Ill leave you to do what you have to do. Everyone will be informed that they should cooperate. If theres anything further I can help you with, you know where I am.

Margot

Its not as much of a coincidence as one might think, our being in the same place. We grew up in the same neighbourhood, went to the same schools, lived close to each other much of our lives. Like homing pigeons, most of us usually do head back to where we started. A knowledge of place is comforting and seductive. Some of us cant help but tread the familiar circle that leads us right back to the beginning, no matter how far we might have strayed. Its no wonder that she and I both chose to end our lives close to where we began, in that same neighbourhood where we skipped our ropes and rode our bikes and sat on the curb sucking on sno-cones with our friends. This, our old neighbourhood, is where all the innocent memories lie.

Ironically, my roommate is the very reason that Im here at all. Why I ended up in this ghastly long-term care home where the impoverished come to die. She is the very reason Im forced to live with her in this small room, only six feet of linoleum and a heavy fabric curtain separating our two beds.