The Chameleon Killer Mystery
Who is the Chameleon Killer?
When you are having a really bad day, drink yourself legless, abuse everyone around you, pass out and try again tomorrow.Trouble is; every day is bad in Rupert Fletcher’s world. He threatens his ex-wife, mocks his girlfriend, abuses his neighbours, and gets into a fight in the pub.
Next day, he is found dead.Who’d want to kill him? Well, almost everybody, but it looks like only one person did. The police arrest his ex-wife’s therapist, Anthon. Anthony’s family claim he is innocent and employ the SeeMs Detective Agency to find the real killer.Cat, Miranda, and Stevie uncover clues that point them back to an intricate web of family injuries and an unexpected connection between the victim and his killer.
Could Rupert’s murderer be The Chameleon Killer, who has already killed before and is bent on revenge? They need to act fast before the killer strikes again.
Purchase Links
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Chameleon-Killer-Mystery-Detective-Agency-ebook/dp/B0CNZL4TG4
https://www.amazon.com/Chameleon-Killer-Mystery-Detective-Agency-ebook/dp/B0CNZL4TG4
Gina has worked as a pilot, physiotherapist, freelance writer and dog breeder. As a child, Gina's parents hated travelling and never went further than Jersey.
As a result she became travel-addicted and spent years bumming around SE Asia, China and Australia, where she worked in a racing stables in Pinjarra, South of Perth. She then lived and worked in various places in Spain, the USA and London before settling in West Sussex with her husband and dogs.
This is her fourth crime novel in the SeeMs Detective Agency series. This book is set between Sussex and London.
https://www.instagram.com/ginacheynewriter/
https://www.facebook.com/gina.cheyne.books
https://reedsy.com/discovery/user/ginacheyne
https://www.tiktok.com/@flyfizzi
Extract from the beginning of The Chameleon Killer Mystery
By Gina Cheyne
In the last book Victoria escaped from the SeeMs Detectives, this scene briefly recaps how she escaped and leads on to what happens next in the book.
Chapter One: Prior Planning Prevents Piss-Ups
As the car stopped, Victoria looked up at the sky. It was clear with a light wind: a perfectly lovely afternoon for flying the Tiger Moth. A perfect evening for dying? Perhaps. She glanced at Stevie, who stared back emotionless.
‘So,’ said Victoria, ‘now you know why I told you everything?’
Stevie was silent.
‘I think you do!’ Victoria allowed her voice to be triumphant. ‘And we are going down as one. Tonight we will be together … where, do you think? Cosy in Hell? I doubt Heaven has room for people like us. By the way, don’t think of staying alive by tripping me over, hoping the gun will kill me by mistake. I’ve left all the information on my phone. The police will enjoy reading it all, I imagine.’
She licked her lips, her gun hand completely steady. She manoeuvred her legs out of the small car and picked up the cushion she’d been sitting on. She tucked it under the arm leaning on the walking stick.
Leaning on her stick she slowly moved down the path to the Owly Vale flying strip, dragging her withered legs, the gun still steady in her hand. She motioned Stevie to walk slightly ahead of her.
At the bottom of the garden, they reached the hangar, and Victoria collapsed onto a low wall. This was the furthest she’d walked for a long time.
Stevie opened the electric doors, dived into the hangar to fetch the plane.
Victoria watched, hunched on the wall. Regaining her strength. Stevie looked about twelve years old, Victoria thought, with her pixie haircut and her wiry frame. Hard to believe she was a first officer at British Airways and an important member of the SeeMs Detective team. Victoria herself was slim, but compared to Stevie she was a giant.
She gave a low whistle. ‘Woohoo. Did you put this all down yourself? Build the hangar? All the concreting? Even the electric doors?’
‘Yes.’
‘You really will be a loss to society, won’t you? Shame.’
‘You’d better sit in the front seat,’ Stevie said gruffly.
Victoria spat. ‘Pah! You must think I’m green. I’m sitting where I can see what you are up to. I know there’s only a radio in the back, not in the front. You won’t be able to call for help, and I’m certainly not going to. Now I’m going to show you how brilliantly Victoria flies. Even after all this time.’
Stevie said nothing.
Victoria clambered into the back cockpit of the Tiger Moth, keeping her gun trained on the younger woman.
‘Switches on.’
Stevie pulled the propellor and the obedient little craft started immediately. She pulled out the chocks, storing them by the trolley, then climbed into the front cockpit with a single lithe movement.
Victoria stored the gun in her flying suit, then, smiling slightly, she pulled out a second, a toy gun, and placed it in the map pouch. When Stevie saw that she had been fooled by a toy gun, she was going to be so embarrassed. Victoria chuckled quietly, thinking how angry and upset Stevie would feel.
Victoria taxied away from the hangar and along a neat grass alleyway to where Stevie had mown a long wide strip with an orange windsock on one side. She turned the Tiger Moth to face into the wind.
Taking off, Victoria climbed to a thousand feet. Although her damaged legs vibrated on the pedals, unused to the pressure, she was surprised how quickly her ‘flying muscles’ returned. However, she knew they would not last very long, but then it wasn’t going to be very long before they died.
She began circling, getting used to the feel of the light machine, so different from the airliners she used to fly. Laughing, she pulled back the power and dived down to the level of the trees sinuously. Propelling the machine low over the grass, rising for the bumps in the field, pulling straight up to avoid the trees, nipping over the branches, hearing the leaves tickling the underside of the canvas as she straightened up.
‘Yay! Yay! Yay!’ She whooped ecstatically down the elderly speaking tube. ‘I’d forgotten how much fun it was to fly.’
Stevie said nothing.
Victoria began climbing to height. One thousand. Two thousand. She levelled at three thousand feet and smiled at the countryside spread out like toys in the sunshine.
‘I’ve always wondered,’ she purred into the intercom. ‘How long can you stay upside down before the fuel runs out of the engine? Haven’t you?’
Stevie said nothing.
Victoria undid her seat belt, letting the two pieces fall to the side. She rolled the Tiger Moth upside down and counted, holding herself in the machine with her hands.
‘One, two, three, four, five, six, seven …’
The engine stopped.
The world was silent.
For a moment Victoria held herself, suspended between life and death.
Then she let go.
Screaming. She fell.
Looking up, she watched the plane disappear above her. One. Two. Three.
Victoria pulled the rip cord. Her parachute blossomed above her.
She laughed.
In the sky Stevie was righting the machine, too busy to see what Victoria was doing, fighting to land a plane with a dead engine in an area of small fields intersected by trees and avoiding the village of Owly Vale.
Victoria laughed again. Let them imagine she was dead. Let them believe what they liked.
They wouldn’t recognise her when they saw her again. They had no idea of her genius. Her ability with disguise. Not even Stevie understood she was a chameleon amongst humans.
Prior Planning Prevents Piss-Poor Performance! And her planning was perfect.
Chapter One: Prior Planning Prevents Piss-Ups
As the car stopped, Victoria looked up at the sky. It was clear with a light wind: a perfectly lovely afternoon for flying the Tiger Moth. A perfect evening for dying? Perhaps. She glanced at Stevie, who stared back emotionless.
‘So,’ said Victoria, ‘now you know why I told you everything?’
Stevie was silent.
‘I think you do!’ Victoria allowed her voice to be triumphant. ‘And we are going down as one. Tonight we will be together … where, do you think? Cosy in Hell? I doubt Heaven has room for people like us. By the way, don’t think of staying alive by tripping me over, hoping the gun will kill me by mistake. I’ve left all the information on my phone. The police will enjoy reading it all, I imagine.’
She licked her lips, her gun hand completely steady. She manoeuvred her legs out of the small car and picked up the cushion she’d been sitting on. She tucked it under the arm leaning on the walking stick.
Leaning on her stick she slowly moved down the path to the Owly Vale flying strip, dragging her withered legs, the gun still steady in her hand. She motioned Stevie to walk slightly ahead of her.
At the bottom of the garden, they reached the hangar, and Victoria collapsed onto a low wall. This was the furthest she’d walked for a long time.
Stevie opened the electric doors, dived into the hangar to fetch the plane.
Victoria watched, hunched on the wall. Regaining her strength. Stevie looked about twelve years old, Victoria thought, with her pixie haircut and her wiry frame. Hard to believe she was a first officer at British Airways and an important member of the SeeMs Detective team. Victoria herself was slim, but compared to Stevie she was a giant.
She gave a low whistle. ‘Woohoo. Did you put this all down yourself? Build the hangar? All the concreting? Even the electric doors?’
‘Yes.’
‘You really will be a loss to society, won’t you? Shame.’
‘You’d better sit in the front seat,’ Stevie said gruffly.
Victoria spat. ‘Pah! You must think I’m green. I’m sitting where I can see what you are up to. I know there’s only a radio in the back, not in the front. You won’t be able to call for help, and I’m certainly not going to. Now I’m going to show you how brilliantly Victoria flies. Even after all this time.’
Stevie said nothing.
Victoria clambered into the back cockpit of the Tiger Moth, keeping her gun trained on the younger woman.
‘Switches on.’
Stevie pulled the propellor and the obedient little craft started immediately. She pulled out the chocks, storing them by the trolley, then climbed into the front cockpit with a single lithe movement.
Victoria stored the gun in her flying suit, then, smiling slightly, she pulled out a second, a toy gun, and placed it in the map pouch. When Stevie saw that she had been fooled by a toy gun, she was going to be so embarrassed. Victoria chuckled quietly, thinking how angry and upset Stevie would feel.
Victoria taxied away from the hangar and along a neat grass alleyway to where Stevie had mown a long wide strip with an orange windsock on one side. She turned the Tiger Moth to face into the wind.
Taking off, Victoria climbed to a thousand feet. Although her damaged legs vibrated on the pedals, unused to the pressure, she was surprised how quickly her ‘flying muscles’ returned. However, she knew they would not last very long, but then it wasn’t going to be very long before they died.
She began circling, getting used to the feel of the light machine, so different from the airliners she used to fly. Laughing, she pulled back the power and dived down to the level of the trees sinuously. Propelling the machine low over the grass, rising for the bumps in the field, pulling straight up to avoid the trees, nipping over the branches, hearing the leaves tickling the underside of the canvas as she straightened up.
‘Yay! Yay! Yay!’ She whooped ecstatically down the elderly speaking tube. ‘I’d forgotten how much fun it was to fly.’
Stevie said nothing.
Victoria began climbing to height. One thousand. Two thousand. She levelled at three thousand feet and smiled at the countryside spread out like toys in the sunshine.
‘I’ve always wondered,’ she purred into the intercom. ‘How long can you stay upside down before the fuel runs out of the engine? Haven’t you?’
Stevie said nothing.
Victoria undid her seat belt, letting the two pieces fall to the side. She rolled the Tiger Moth upside down and counted, holding herself in the machine with her hands.
‘One, two, three, four, five, six, seven …’
The engine stopped.
The world was silent.
For a moment Victoria held herself, suspended between life and death.
Then she let go.
Screaming. She fell.
Looking up, she watched the plane disappear above her. One. Two. Three.
Victoria pulled the rip cord. Her parachute blossomed above her.
She laughed.
In the sky Stevie was righting the machine, too busy to see what Victoria was doing, fighting to land a plane with a dead engine in an area of small fields intersected by trees and avoiding the village of Owly Vale.
Victoria laughed again. Let them imagine she was dead. Let them believe what they liked.
They wouldn’t recognise her when they saw her again. They had no idea of her genius. Her ability with disguise. Not even Stevie understood she was a chameleon amongst humans.
Prior Planning Prevents Piss-Poor Performance! And her planning was perfect.
