by Matt Drabble
As their business grew and changed, so did their relationship. Ghost had always felt that he was capable of leaving a mark on the world. His beginnings were inauspicious; he’d never known his parents only the orphanage. From an early age, he had felt never quite all there, he was always on the outside, a peripheral figure lurking in the background and in a room full of people he would go unnoticed. Jimmy had always had the opposite problem, always the centre of the room and of the attention. He had been a child that demanded awareness as people were drawn to him in spite of themselves. As they grew into young men Jimmy’s nature expanded and filled along with his physique. From his early teens, women would flock to him drawn to his looks and magnetism. Ghost would often find himself left behind, crushed in the stampede, more often than not, he knew that he would have shied away from the attention that Jimmy revealed in. But just very occasionally, he would feel the vague pangs of jealousy. Fortunately these feelings passed as he began to feel more and more content to fade into the shadows and let Jimmy stand out front in the screaming limelight. He knew that they needed each other; he knew that he would never get in the front door without Jimmy, and Jimmy would be dead or in jail long before now without his guidance.
CHAPTER TEN
April 2012
Ghost walked carefully up the pathway having first scouted around the house. The home was modest, especially given the amount of money that Gareth Jenkins had earned in years since he had been on the company’s payroll. The lawn was cut within an inch of its life, the grass lushly green and treated. The bedding plants lined like soldiers on parade and all stood to attention. The house was detached within a cul-de-sac of brethren, all proud and gleaming, with second cars lining some of the driveways. Ghost drove one of the company’s pool cars, a nondescript Japanese sedan, selected for its anonymity.
The Port Authority Manger Jenkins had been paid a small fortune as their contact, he was the facilitator; every shipment from around the globe, came into Fresh Haven under his nose. Every container that they wanted to pass without inspection came through the port with a whisper. Jenkins was never a greedy man; he was stably married with a loving daughter away at university.
Ghost approached the house wearing the uniform of the bureaucrat, scuffed brown loafers, stone collared khakis, a short sleeve beige shirt, a slightly stained tie and a Port Authority ID tag, procured for the occasion. Ghost’s wardrobe at home was a cornucopia of outfits for many events and outings. Another of the number one rules in the Ghost handbook was preparation, there was an old sporting mantra that said, “Fail to prepare and prepare to fail”. Ghost was never one to draw attention at the best of times; his greatest weapon had always been his anonymity. He was not about to pull up to this modest cul-de-sac in a luxury automobile, wearing an expensive tailored suit and flashing a watch worth more than the average car on the block.
Despite being late afternoon and a sunny mild day, the front windows of the Jenkins house were all closed and the curtains drawn against the sunshine. Holding a clipboard with Port Authority headed paper on it, Ghost strode in a confident manner up the pathway to the front door, and rang the bell without hesitation. A confident manner and a clipboard, accomplished a lot more than waving a large handgun, he had found in his work. There was no immediate answer from within the darkened dwelling; Ghost peered through the frosted glass of the front door. Inside he could only make out that the curtains must be drawn in every room close to the hallway, as the blackness seemed to resonate throughout. Now he faced a quandary, he needed to find out what had happened to Jenkins as soon as possible as the man was crucial to their operations at the port. He could break into the house without too much trouble, but the risk of being witnessed by a twitching curtain on the close was great. He glanced back casually; the cul-de-sac appeared at first glance to be deserted. There were only a couple of cars on driveways; Ghost had picked the school rush hour time deliberately in case of such a scenario. As part of the perks of working with the organization, the Jenkins family had been provided with the house at a bargain price, low enough to afford but not low enough to raise suspicions. When they had moved into the area, Ghost had used his own people to handle the sale of the house, the financing, the removal, and the changing of the locks. Ghost had close to thirty sets of house keys safely secured at his home of employees of the firm, from accountants and lawyers, to wheel and trigger men. Jimmy as usual had balked at the large expensive of providing homes for their employees at lower than cost price, but Ghost saw it as an invaluable investment in his future, one that he hoped would never include a prison cell.
Ghost slid the front door key into the lock and felt the tumblers tumble and the door swing open. The darkness was not welcoming; Ghost eased into the black hallway silently and closed the door against the light behind him. His senses were flying, his nerves tingled and his fingers twitched, for the first time he found himself wishing that he had brought a little protection. Checking up on a man like Jenkins had not required the risk of coming armed, and yet now he was uncharacteristically nervous.
Ghost was a man who had been surrounded by violence all of his life, his story was one of unknown parentage and state system bouncing, as far back as he could remember he had always been alone. The orphanage at St Marys had been a way station, he left others alone, and they in turn, did not bother him. The nuns had their hands full of many disruptively damaged kids, and only had so much energy and attention to go around. Abraham had been a quiet child, never noticed, and never seen, he had floated at the back of everyone’s attention drifting through classes and time rippleless. He had always known that he was meant for something special, he knew that he was possible of achieving, but he did not know what. It had only been when he saw Jimmy attacking the bully that he realized his potential was at hand. He knew that they made quite the pair, Jimmy the psychopath and Ghost the sociopath. Two halves of the same badly formed mind, combining to make one whole and deranged person, rather than one that was complete and normal. Ghost knew that he lacked the tools to form a real boy; he was missing some vital ingredients. He wasn’t angry like Jimmy, he wasn’t sadistic like Jimmy could be, but he just wasn’t all there. A few years ago he had been transfixed by an American TV show called Dexter, the show was about a serial killer functioning in the real world. Ghost had watched the first season over and over again, the story of a man who had no emotions, no love and no hate, had fascinated him. Dexter lived by a code taught by his adoptive father who was also a policeman and taught him to channel his desire to kill, into disposing of those criminals who had beaten the system. Dexter followed this code not because he believed in the cause, not because he wished to become an avenging angel, it was merely out of self-preservation. He knew that he had a dark desire to kill, but this way was better than getting caught stabbing a random citizen in broad daylight. Ghost had immediately identified with the character, whilst he did not share Dexter’s passion for murder; the difficulty of seeming human in the eyes of your surroundings was one that Ghost had long struggled with. He had learned how to fake emotions over the years, but he still did not genuinely feel any of them, he had never known real love or subsequent loss. His reactions to personal stories were always slightly delayed as he watched others to take their lead. He had experimented with sexual relationships with the various women that the firm employed at the clubs and bars but hadn’t taken any great pleasure from the experiences. Sex seemed to be an awkward and messy affair, the women either feigned as much interest as he did, or became clingy and intrusive. In one on one situations he never knew just what was expected of him and how he was supposed to respond. He did not feel attracted to men either, but had not experimented in this direction as he was well aware of the attitude towards homosexuality in his industry. Eventually he became successful and feared enough, that he no longer felt that his actions were the cause of comment, as Jimmy became the only man alive that could question them. It was clear from very early in their budding careers that violence was an essentia
l tool. Whilst Jimmy had natural violent tenancies and a predilection for causing pain, Ghost had had to work at the subject. He had studied for this new skill with the same dedication that he studied everything, nothing was left to chance, and no stone was left unturned. He firstly attacked his physical makeover; he was in decent natural shape to begin with, but soon swelled his frame with painful dedication. He studied with every fitness and martial arts trainer that he could find, devouring their knowledge and compiling his own internal database, from Nigerian Dambe to Japanese Ninjitsu and everything in-between. As he trained, he found that his mind was somewhat empty and eager to be filled, perhaps from its lacking of natural human emotions, there was a lot of free space available. Even after years of training Ghost was well aware that real life was nothing like the movies. It did not matter how much physical prowess you had, ten guys did not form an orderly circle and attack you one at a time. Skills counted for nothing against superior numbers and blunt objects. The trick was always to create an aura that nobody fucked with. His own men were wary of him through experiences, but they were scared of Jimmy because he was quite simply crazy. Early in their budding criminality Ghost and Jimmy had taken on The Raphael’s from Sandy Bay, a small town several miles along the coast from Fresh Haven. The Raphael’s had been well known throughout the territory, their reputation was drenched in blood, and they were ruthless and bloody. Ghost and Jimmy had driven up to The Raphael’s home turf, loud and proud. In a deserted parking lot behind a closed shopping centre, Ghost and Jimmy had taken on Tom Raphael and four of his biggest lieutenants. The two of them unarmed against wicked blades and blunt battering. Whilst Ghost had fought with skill and direction, Jimmy was a wild man caring little for his own safety and spraying as much of his own blood as he spilt. The CCTV footage that Ghost had obtained from one of the outlets became their fable. The two gladiator’s victorious stance against desperate odds raised their profile and started their legend. The footage of Jimmy unleashing his rage ran the courage to water of their competition. Ghost knew that most of the crews around them were run by talkers; now the whole world could see that here at last, was the real deal.
Ghost edged along the hallway, his back pressed against the wall, his body turned slightly sideways to minimize himself as a target. Once inside the house, he was first struck by the pungent smell, it was blood and death. He knew that he should immediately head back out of the house and away from a soon to be crime scene, but he pressed on against his own better judgement. Whatever had happened here could be related to the firm and Jenkins job within it. He would need all advance knowledge before the police investigation gears began turning. He knew from the regular surveillance that he kept on all of their civilian associates, that Jenkins had an office at home. He’d had the system regularly hacked from a remote access point after a subsidiary of the firm had installed the computer equipment. At the last scheduled check, there was nothing incriminating towards them on the Port Authorities Manger system, only some mild porn of the normal variety was carefully hidden.
As Ghost edged silently along the wall, he unhooked a small but powerful keychain torch that he always carried; evaluating the risk, he shone the light around the lounge area. The curtains were not just drawn; someone had hung thick woollen blankets taping them with duck tape to the walls creating a blackout effect. The room was lightless and airless, the atmosphere was choking, and an unmistakable copper smell hung heavy in the lifeless room. Ghost edged around the plush sofa that dominated the middle of the spacious room. A small delicate foot poked out to welcome him in an obscene greeting. On inspection, the body was much larger than the single foot had suggested. The woman was in her fifties, with limp and inert hair that fell around her downturned face. She wore a white nightie that strained at the seams to contain her large bulk. Ghost knew this woman had been Mrs Jenkins, the man in question’s wife. The nightie had risen up the back of her legs leaving the doughy white flesh exposed. Ghost had seen his share of death before, but the colour of the woman seemed strange, her once pink skin appeared translucent with a bluish hue. He could not see any sure signs of violence on the body as it lay face down and he was not about to move any closer, and certainly not touch the corpse. Ghost knew the Eagleport forensic boys were the top of the tree when it came to finding rogue hairs and fibres, and he was not about to place himself at the scene.
He eased himself back out the way he came and headed for the fragranced relief of the outside. A feeling of sound caught his senses; it was not a noise as most people would perceive it, but Ghost’s reactions were honed to be razor sharp, it was what kept him alive. He froze instantly, eyes closed he felt the house, his mind drifted around the room and beyond. Sightlessly he explored the darkness, claiming his surroundings and searching for intrusion. Eventually he released the breath that he had been unwittingly holding; now the notion of being nervous, was the very thing making him nervous. It had been years since he had felt anxious in any way, and he did not like it. He had always found it annoying that in every scary house movie, every character in it had never seen a scary house movie, he was not about to betray his instincts and start exploring the house alone and unarmed.
Slowly he backed down the hallway, his eyes constantly flitting around in the gloom, his fists clenched, and muscles tensed, ready for any confrontation. The front door bumped softly into his lower back startling him, he knew that he would feel foolish the moment that he stepped foot back out into the world. He deliberately stayed his hand on the door handle and held for a second longer than he wanted to. He captured his feelings of the house and the body, imprinting them on his memory, ensuring that they would not be dismissed so easily once he felt safe. In a flash, he was outside again, the evening dusk was rolling in, and it wasn’t until he safely behind the wheel of the rental car and pulling out onto the main road again hit by the headlights of other drivers did he relax. As he thought, his mind began to rationalize his feelings, processing the raw data and finding explanations. He stopped his thought process savagely and grasped hold of the captured moment just before he’d left. Again he felt the blackness of the house, the strange colour of the body and the sense of someone else there. The feeling of everything out of balance, he looked down at the steering wheel and his hands trembled.
