Meta Zero One by Martin J Moss Read Free Book Online

meal for two, then murder your wife.
     
      There was in fact nothing to suggest that they were anything other than your average American family.
     
      But your average American family didn't usually end up gutted in their own bedroom.
     
      The fridge was full, there was beer and white wine chilling, and he noticed with interest an expensive bottle of champagne cooling. Ready, he thought, for the big day, the plan no doubt being to crack it open when Jean-Marie and the new baby arrived home.
     
      Shame to waste it, he thought, taking it out of the fridge it was a classic year and far more expensive than he could afford. Smiling to himself, Elroy Cockram grabbed a glass from the cupboard, sat down at the kitchen table and opened the Windrow's celebratory champagne and poured himself a glass.
     
      “Lovely,” he said, watching the bubbles form in the imperfections on the glass. Now, he thought, what now? There was a perfectly normal kitchen, dishwasher full, cookbooks on the table, fridge cooling wine and beer, washing machine full of dirty clothes.
     
      Washing machine, he thought, you can tell a lot by looking at someone’s laundry. Tipping back the champagne in one satisfying gulp, he placed the glass carefully on the table and stood up. Then kneeling by the washing machine he pressed the button and opened the door.
     
       The smell of clean washing filled his nose, immediately taking him back 20 years to helping his mum hang out the clothes to dry. He pulled something out and put it to his face, breathing in the fresh clean smell, breathing deeply, enjoying the moment immensely. He realised suddenly that he was sniffing a pair of Jean-Maries French knickers, so he smiled looked around self-consciously and put it in his pocket, for later. They would fetch quite a lot on EBay.
     
      It was right at the back of the drum where he found it, even though he didn’t know what it was he was looking for when he had started.
     
       But he knew when he found it.
     
      Holding the distinctive green and yellow shirt in his hand, he reached into his pocket. Pulling out the coffee jar, he examined what it contained. Careful not to drop it he held up the shirt next to it, the thing inside was motionless and seemingly asleep.
     
       “Fuck me,” he said.
     
      It all made a sick kind of sense to him now.
     
     
     
      “How is he doing?” Elroy looked though the one-way glass into the interrogation room. Steven sat at the desk, his arms strapped to the arms of his chair by thick leather bands. He rocked slowly back and forth moaning to himself.
     
      “Not too bad considering,” said his colleague Dr Francine Miller. She was tall with long fiery red hair, and Elroy had liked her since the moment they first met three years ago, when he had interviewed her for the job of head medical officer. They had flirted for years, and he had toyed with the idea of asking her out so many times but despite himself, he couldn’t build up the courage. 
     
       He was sure she was single and also sure that she knew how he felt, that she knew the effect of her glasses and tied up hair, and short skirts had on him. But there was something about her that made him keep his distance.
     
      Francine looked him up and down and smiled over her glasses, her hazel eyes seemed to know exactly what he was thinking, Elroy found himself blushing uncontrollably.
     
      “Considering that his wife and at least one child died last night and he is so doped up on Dopamine that he couldn't stand up if he tried, he is doing pretty well,” she continued.
     
      They were standing in the viewing room of interrogation cell 101, 15 floors underground in the FBI's euphemistically called Superpowers Liaison Office. It was just outside New York City and from the outside it looked like any other anonymous government facility. The upper levels did in fact serve as the office for traffic management, and the milk marketing division, two