by H. P. Bayne
Once the heart of the city, Riverview had fallen into disrepair when a new downtown was constructed to the west. The area had sunk even further when a flood devastated Kimotan Rapids a few years back. By now, the wealthy had rebuilt their homes and businesses. But while big business and the rich had snapped up office space and condos in the shiny, new towers to the west, social supports remained where they were in Riverview. Because of that, the poor had stayed too—which Sully figured was exactly what the wealthy had hoped for in the first place.
As a result, streets like the ones Liam Hofner and Pip Radler reportedly lived on contained a mix of run-down homes and others that were completely abandoned and boarded up. Those who stayed were people too poor to afford anything better or those who took advantage of the abandoned homes or low-rent properties to run gang activity or drug houses. A house a block from Liam’s had exploded when a meth cook went wrong a while back.
Sully knew Dez had been banking on Liam. Unfortunately, Liam wasn’t around.
Dez frowned after nearly a full minute waiting at the door following several attempts at knocking. “Great. Guess we’re stuck with Radler.”
“If he answers,” Sully said.
Dez filled him in further as they drove between addresses.
“Depending on his mood and what he’s mixed up in at the moment, Pip’s known to run. If we were armed, I’d have us each take a door to cover off the exits. As it stands, I’d rather we stick together.”
Sully was fine with that. Already, they’d passed a middle-aged man on a front stoop who’d formed his hand into a gun shape while glaring through their vehicle’s windows. Whether it was a threat he hoped to make good on was anyone’s guess, and Sully didn’t want to stick around long enough to find out.
Dez pulled over toward the opposite end of the block, just this side of a small, peeling, two-storey house with a lawn of weeds and a dilapidated white-picket fence.
Sully eyed the roof where shingles had peeled back in numerous places. “Needs a new roof.”
Dez, too, eyed the building. “Needs a new everything.”
He led the way from the vehicle, leaving Sully to follow. As usual, Dez—both a former police officer and an overprotective big brother—had a few extra words for Sully before they reached the door.
“Stay a little behind me and be ready to jump on my say-so. These days, everyone with a serious drug habit is packing heat. When Pip’s had a recent hit, he gets paranoid and delusional. One time, it took six of us and two shots from a Taser to wrestle him into a police cruiser.”
“If he’s in a mood like that, he won’t be any help finding Callum,” Sully said.
Dez twisted his lips. “Nope.” He made for the front door at the top of a short set of rickety steps. There, they stood shadowed beneath an awning that had largely outlived its usefulness in terms of providing protection from the elements. Dez raised a big fist and rapped on the door.
One thing about larger-scale drug dealers Sully had observed: the rest of their houses might be going to pot—so to speak—but their doors were something to be proud of. Steel with solid, reliable hinges, these beasts wouldn’t easily be kicked in by home-invading gangsters or raiding police.
For some reason, the door hadn’t come with a peephole, and as far as Sully could make out, Pip hadn’t invested in a security camera.
Movement at the window had Sully glancing over in time to see horizontal, vinyl blinds snapping back into place. When no one came to the door after a few moments had passed, Sully peered up at Dez.
“Maybe we should knock again?”
Dez crossed his arms stubbornly. “Go for it.”
Sully drummed his knuckles against the door, then stepped back, unsurprised when Dez shouldered slightly in front of him. Sully held back the sigh.
When still no one answered, Dez tried another tactic. “Radler! I know you’re in there! Open up! We just want to talk to you!”
Sully was pretty sure the entire block had heard Dez, but the boom of his yell did the trick. The door snapped open, revealing a man in his thirties with the skinny build and pallid complexion of a serious drug addict.
“Jesus, the hell you doin’? You looking to get me killed?”
Dez tilted his head. “What’s the problem, Pip?”
Pip stuck out his neck far enough to eye what he could of the street from the awning, then ducked back inside. “Heard you weren’t a cop no more. What you doin’ here?”
“I’m not a cop. I’m a PI. My brother and I need to find someone, and we hear you might know where we can look.”
“So you’re not here for me?”
Dez’s lips curled. “Nope. It’s your lucky day.”
Pip pulled open the door all the way and stepped back into the entry far enough to allow them to enter. Dez didn’t move.
“Where’s your piece? I want it out in the open and on the floor, unloaded and where you can’t get at it.”
Pip had clearly been through this before. He reached behind him and pulled what turned out to be a beater of a revolver from the back of his jeans.
Dez raised his brows. “Where’d you get that thing? A museum? It’s older than dirt.”
“Hey, it works.”
“How d’you know?”
Pip didn’t have an answer, and Sully figured it was best they not find out. Anyway, Sully had enough to focus on. Like many people who lived their lives in dark places, Pip came with a ghost. Sully forced himself to look away as soon as he saw her. With two to deal with already, he didn’t have the time or the mental energy to take on a third.
Dez led the way inside but stopped in the entryway, within easy reach of the discarded firearm. Sully came in behind him and only just managed to shut the door with both him and Dez crammed into the small space.
Pip eyed him. “You’re the brother, I take it?”
Sully didn’t bother trying to extend a hand, no room to maneuver for a handshake. “Sullivan Gray.”
A flicker of recognition crossed Pip’s face, the kind that was quickly becoming familiar to Sully. “Weren’t you on the news?”
Best to explain before Pip came up with his own incorrect assumption. “I was a witness at the murder trial for my dad’s brother.”
Pip’s mouth opened in a smile suggesting he recognized this as the truth. “Right. I remember. You’re the guy who sees ghosts.” Pip leaned in. “That true, or you make it up?”
Sully sensed the ghost moving closer, as if having overheard the conversation. She probably had.
“True,” Sully said. He hoped to leave it there, but Pip’s curiosity wasn’t abated.
“Why the different last name? Don’t want to be associated with the Braddocks?” Pip snorted at his own comment. “Don’t blame you.”
Sully opted to answer truthfully, hopeful it would eventually lead to some quid pro quo. “The Braddocks took me in as a kid. Save Lowell, they’re the best.”
Pip grunted, the sound suggesting he didn’t agree. If Dez had been involved in busting him in the past, no doubt the dealer felt he had his reasons.
Dez spoke up, pulling the conversation back on track. “If you can help us out with something, we’ll be out of your hair before you know it. We’re looking for a guy named Callum Wynne. You know him?”
Pip’s mouth clamped shut as he eyed Dez. Sully read it there: Pip was searching for the game. “Maybe I do, maybe I don’t. I meet a lot of people.”
Dez deadpanned. “Yep, you sure do.”
It was clear Dez and Pip weren’t the best of friends. If someone was going to get him to come around, Sully suspected it would have to be him.
“I think you’d remember him,” he said. “He was arrested with you a couple of years back. You and a few guys were picked up with a bunch of drugs and weapons. You remember that, I’m sure.”
“Comes to mind,” Pip said. He crossed his arms, further closing himself off. “What’s it to you?”
“Nothing,” Sully said. “We want to talk
to Callum, that’s all. We thought you might know where to find him.”
“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t.” It was becoming a catch phrase. “Still don’t know what it is to you.”
Dez said nothing, and Sully guessed he’d come to the same conclusion about their best chance at cracking this guy. Sully decided a little more truth was necessary—or a version of the truth, anyway.
“His great aunt died recently, and we’ve got reason to believe it was a homicide. Callum might have spent some time with her shortly before her death. We want to ask him about anything he might have seen, but we also need to make sure he’s safe. We thought you might be able to help.”
Pip turned his head slightly to the side, allowing him to study Sully from the corner of his eye. “You thinking Cal had something to do with it?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Sully spoke carefully. “We can’t rule anyone out yet. What we do know is this lady was a known recluse, but she allowed Callum into her home. Which suggests she trusted him and cared about him. I’d be surprised if he’s guilty of hurting her, but we’ll need to speak with him if we’re going to clear him of suspicion. You wouldn’t just be helping us by pointing us toward Callum. You’d be helping him too.”
“Who says I want to help him? He never did anything for me.”
At least they’d got Pip to admit to knowing Callum—a small win, but a win nonetheless.
Dez, unfortunately, was losing patience. “Look, do you know where he is or don’t you? And don’t give us the ‘Maybe I do, maybe I don’t’ crap.”
Pip turned a glare on Dez, his mouth forming a line as flat as a prairie skyline. Sully managed to push himself past Dez to put himself between the two men.
“I know you don’t know us, and you have every reason to be suspicious. I get it. But we really do need your help.”
Pip’s gaze trained back on Sully. His arms had yet to uncross, but the muscles in his face softened as a cool smile played around his lips. “What’s in it for me?”
Damn, Sully thought. He’d have to go there, after all.
“You’ve got a woman with you.”
The smile didn’t fade. “Nope. No one here but me.”
“She’s not the kind you can see.”
The grin fell. Pip didn’t say anything—he didn’t have to. The questions were there, written all over his face. Not a non-believer, then. This was a man who knew he was haunted but didn’t understand why.
It would make for some damn good currency in their bid for information.
Sully set about answering a few of Pip’s yet-unasked questions. “She’s young, in her twenties. Blonde hair, green eyes. Might be pretty, but it’s a bit hard to tell since she’s been stabbed so many times. Her face and neck took the brunt of the attack. I don’t get the impression she’s related to you, but she cares about you. I don’t think she blames you for anything that happened to her, so you’re probably not responsible. Maybe a girlfriend?”
The colour had drained from Pip’s face in the time it had taken Sully to describe the woman. His hand reached for the wall, and he leaned into it, the line of his body suggesting he was barely keeping his feet. When his knees started to sag, Sully stepped forward and grabbed hold of him.
He glanced over his shoulder to catch Dez’s eye. “Help me get him to the couch.”
Dez got a grip on his arm and lugged him to the sofa, depositing him there before taking a step back. Sully checked the coffee table to ensure he wouldn’t puncture himself on anything drug-related before perching on the edge of it to face Pip.
The man was using a hand to prop up his head, and Sully gave him a solid minute to recompose himself before questioning him further.
“Pip?”
An eye peered up at Sully from beneath a fringe of hair. “I see her sometimes, like out of the corner of my eye. Saw her one night in my bedroom. Thought I was seeing things, going crazy, like. She’s really here?”
Sully nodded. “She’s sitting next to you now.”
Pip’s head snapped up and to the side, as if he’d be able to see her if he looked quickly enough. Unsurprisingly, his expression suggested a lack of success, and he returned his gaze to Sully.
“Why is she here?”
Sully shrugged. “I don’t know. I’d have to ask her. Do you want me to?”
Pip’s brows lowered over narrowed eyes. “Yeah, of course I do,” he snapped.
The corners of Sully’s lips quirked up a little. “Then I’m going to need you to help us first. Tell us how to find Callum, and I’ll give you a hand with your ghost friend.”
Pip maintained a solid glare for a few long seconds before raising a brow. “Hang on a minute. How do I know you didn’t get all that info from the cops? She was murdered, and her body was found with all those injuries you’re describing. Tell me something I don’t already know.”
Sully raised a brow. “If I tell you something you don’t know, how will it prove anything to you?”
Pip scowled. “You know what I mean. If she’s really here, get her to tell you something only I’d know.”
Sully cringed inwardly. There was never any telling how spirits would choose to communicate, whether they would simply show him what they wanted him to see or if they would force him to relive every horrific aspect of their deaths.
He was grateful Dez was nearby, finding relief in the fact his brother would pull him out if the situation took a bad turn. That in mind, Sully turned full attention to the woman seated next to Pip.
“He needs proof you exist. I can’t hear you, but if you touch my hand and think of what you want him to know, I’ll see it.”
Ghosts stuck around for a variety of reasons, but most—if not all—seemed to have unfinished business they were desperate to deal with. This woman was no exception, proving it by shooting toward Sully in the blink of an eye, her ice-cold touch blasting an image into his brain that ended seconds after it began.
It wasn’t what Sully had in mind when he’d asked for proof.
He turned back reluctantly to face Pip. “Uh …”
The dealer’s eyebrows disappeared beneath his fringe. “What?”
Sully tried to fight back the blush but failed. “When you asked her to show me something only you’d know, she took you literally. It’s pretty—uh—intimate.”
Pip said nothing, his expression revealing he had yet to be impressed. Sully saw no alternative.
“She liked to dress up like a cowgirl,” Sully said.
“What, like for Halloween?” Dez asked.
Sully shook his head. “Nope. Bedroom.”
“Oh.” No doubt Dez wished he hadn’t asked.
Pip didn’t appear quite sold yet. “And?”
Yes, there was indeed more. “And you pretended to be a bull. A whip was involved. Apparently, she accidentally left a pretty big mark on an area of your body I won’t mention. I’m guessing it scarred.”
Dez burst out laughing. Pip, though, seemed to be fighting another bout of lightheadedness.
“No way. No fucking way you’d know that. She promised she wouldn’t tell.”
“You asked for proof. She just gave it to me.”
Pip regained colour as a blush rose on his cheeks. “Well, forget you ever saw it, all right? Jesus. Okay, fine, I believe you. Now why is she here?”
That was as far as Sully went. “Uh-uh. We had a deal. I can help you but you need to help us first. Callum. Where can we find him?”
“Doesn’t come from me, right?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Dez said.
Sully noted Dez hadn’t precisely promised to keep Pip’s name out of it.
Pip eyed each of them in turn a few more moments before coming out with it. “He stays at a drop house run by the Oldwater Crew.”
This was a new one to Sully. “Who are they?”
Dez answered. “Feeder gang for the Devil’s Cross. Heard some rumblings about the OC setting
up after the flood. Oldwater is for the main road circling the Forks, which is where they base themselves.”
Pip peered up at Dez. “You got it. And that’s where the drop house is.”
Sully could practically hear Dez’s stomach dropping out. Once the nicest part of the city, the Forks had been almost destroyed during the flood. A huge island so named because the Kimotan River split around it, the Forks was considered uninhabitable and off-limits—which meant it was the perfect place for the criminal element and those wishing to go unseen. Sully had been forced to live on the island for close to two years, and he’d hoped to never set foot there again.
Never had come way too soon.
“Where’s the house, exactly?” Sully asked.
“Oldwater Road, obviously. This side of the island. Hard to miss, way it’s fortified.”
Sully thought he might know the place. A couple of gangs had taken up residence not far from the mansion where he’d stayed. “The place with all the pillars or the one with the stone lions?”
“You sound like you know the place.”
“I do,” Sully said. “Wish I didn’t.”
“Stone lions. You want in, though, you best go carrying heat. Around there, they shoot first, you know what I mean.”
Sully knew, all right.
“And you’re sure Callum’s there?”
Pip shrugged. “He’s not in with them yet, but he wants to be. Cal’s a loser, a skid. The kind of kid who needs a babysitter. One thing with the OC: they look after their own, long as you look after them.”
“And how would a member look after them, exactly?”
Pip flashed a few teeth. “Hey, you don’t tell stories about the OC and expect to live.”
Dez spoke up, his question coming through a frown. “Would he be required to pass some sort of test to get in? The sort of test involving murder?”
Another shrug. “I don’t tell tales, but I’ve heard that about several gangs. OC’s not unique, you catch my drift. Now, what about my woman?”
The woman—Sheri, Sully learned her name was—turned out to want nothing more than to tell Pip to straighten himself out. Turned out she’d been killed during a home invasion, one carried out by a small, local street gang wanting to make a name for themselves by getting their hands on Pip’s drug supply. Sheri was the only one home at the time, and she’d paid the ultimate price.
