by Larry Hoy
He flipped the photo over. The back was filled with a short bullet type resume. Just the usual: age, height, weight, and such. The only detail of note was that Sweetwater had trained as a USMC sniper and was recruited out of Memphis. His LEI call sign was listed as Two-Bit. In the box indicating contracts executed, there was a number one followed by an asterisk, but with no indication of what the asterisk meant.
Erebus licked his teeth and sucked down the foam at the bottom of the beer can. Scratching his nose, he ignored the oil it left on his fingers after having gone nearly two days without a shower. For several long minutes he sat, the harsh light of the cheap overhead lamp hanging from the ceiling, memorizing every detail of Luther Sweetwater’s photo.
“You’re just a rookie asshole, but that don’t matter, an asshole is an asshole no matter how long you’ve been doing it. And you ain’t gonna be doing it much longer, Mister Luther Sweetwater from Semple, Tennessee. It’s like the Lord says, if you live by the sword, you die by the sword. That might not mean anything to you, but, in this house, the word of God is the law by which we live.”
He laid the picture back on the table and smoothed it flat.
“I almost got you today, and you don’t even know who I am, do you? No, you ain’t got a clue.” He paused, as if waiting for the image to respond. “But that’s how you guys play it, right? That’s how you like it done? You shoot somebody in the back and then run off with your thirty pieces of silver. Well, don’t you worry none about who I am, you’ll know soon enough. Your day is coming, Luther Sweetwater. Enjoy life while you can.”
Erebus got up and fetched a second beer before heading to his little den, where he fell into a ratty old recliner sitting across the room from an old-style television. A crack in the naugahyde pinched his butt, but he was used to that. He picked up the TV remote and tugged on a lever handle to recline the chair.
Maybe the ten o’clock news would have video of the burning pickup truck, or some cute blonde would be breathlessly standing at the site where William Bonney and his whore girlfriend bled out. Erebus would like to watch either story or, better yet, both. But it wasn’t to be. Against the usual drive-bys and government corruption, the shooting death of some guy and his girlfriend in a dark downtown park barely raised an eyebrow, and a fiery wreck on the interstate was so common that passing motorists barely slowed down anymore. If he was going to attract attention to his crusade, Erebus knew he’d have to ramp things up.
Sweetwater opened the door to the coffee shop and the rich aroma of roasted beans rushed out to embrace him like a lover’s hug. From behind the counter came the hiss of steam, followed by the grumble of milk bubbling into froth. He stopped to savor the moment, like when he ground coffee beans near the entrance at Costco and people commented about how good the caffeine permeating the air smelled. A glass display case of picked-over tarts, cakes, pies, and donuts nevertheless had two slices of carrot cake left, and while they looked a little dried out, and dinner still sat heavy on his stomach, it was going to be a long night. He decided to get those, too.
It took him over half an hour to move from ordering a couple of five-dollar coffees that had a longer pedigree than most thoroughbreds, to actually leaving the shop. After making small talk with a cute older woman in line ahead of him, his mind turned to figuring out who their attacker could be and, more importantly, their motivation. However, when he finally left, careful not to spill even a drop of the precious brown fluid, he was no closer to an answer than when he arrived.
None of it made any sense.
The cardboard bands around the coffee cups only protected his hands for so long before the heat started to hurt. Quickening his pace toward the lobby elevators, Sweetwater punched the button for the 3rd floor with his elbow as he tried to hold the cups without using his palms.
“She senses we’re here, you know,” said a male voice from behind him to the right.
Startled, Sweetwater bobbled both cups, but their tops held and none of the coffee splashed out. A moldy odor suddenly permeated the elevator’s vinyl-paneled cage.
“Goddamn it, Cooper, stop doing that!”
“He’s not doing anything,” answered Grace Allen Tarbeau from his left. “It’s you who keeps summoning us, not the other way around, and I’m getting kind of sick of it.”
“I thought you were dead.”
“I am, as you should know all too well.”
“I didn’t kill you.”
“Maybe not, but you gave my lowlife husband cover and then collected the check. The rest is just semantics.”
“If you’re dead, then why does it bother you to keep haunting me? I mean, is there really a lot to do? It smells to me like all you’re doing is rotting.”
“Now that was rude, Luther,” Cooper said. “It’s not like Grace Allen asked to die.”
Sweetwater could see his fuzzy reflection in the steel elevator doors, but nobody else. Whatever Cooper and Tarbeau were, they didn’t have reflections.
“I’m sorry?”
“You aren’t now,” she said. “Now you’re just being a jerk. But you will be.”
“I don’t know what that means,” Sweetwater said.
Cooper answered, “We’re not at liberty to explain.”
“Explain what?”
“If I can’t explain, then I can’t explain why I can’t explain.”
The elevator dinged upon reaching the 3rd floor. “Please, just go away.”
“We will,” Cooper said. “But remember, if you need us then you have to reach out to us, not the other way around.”
Stepping out into the hallway, Sweetwater glanced back into the elevator to respond, except it was empty.
“I haven’t been drinking enough lately,” he said in a low voice.
Thirteen steps down the hall, he used his foot to bump Warden’s hotel room door in place of a knock. The door creaked open until he saw her in a shooter’s stance, the gun pointed at his chest.
“Just take my coffee lady, you don’t have to shoot me over it.”
“That’s not a bad idea. What took you so long?” she said, taking her cup. She paused with it halfway to her lips. “Who were you talking to?”
“What?”
“There’s a presence around you—presences, plural.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Huh. Okay, forget it. Anyway, I think I’ve figured out part of this.”
Sweetwater put his cup down and blew on his hands to cool them.
“Stop being a baby and sit down,” she said, shaking her head. She pulled up a page and moved to the foot of the bed so they could both see the flat screen TV. There was a picture of a short, balding, overweight man wearing a tweed sport coat and black-rimmed glasses.
“So who is this?” he asked.
“That is Adrian Erebus. He’s a high school math teacher here in Memphis.”
“Yeah, I’d believe that. So why am I looking at this guy?”
“I’ve got this really tricked-up voice recognition program a black hat buddy of mine wrote, so I ran a search,” she said, her voice hanging a second too long, leaving him to wonder what she was leaving out. “I got lucky. He uploaded some classes to his school’s website, and the program found it. Turns out, Homeland Security has a very good database that tracks voices and all the program had to do was access it.”
“Homeland tracks high school websites?”
“Homeland tracks everything.”
“And they share it with LEI?”
“Sort of, they share it with Special—” She stopped and then started again. “They share it with various agencies on an as-needed basis, as well as a few other governments. They built it for China, but the FBI and CIA were quick to jump on board to track terrorists. Then Homeland swallowed it.”
“That kind of shit gives me a headache. So, you’re sure this is the guy who killed Bonney? It’s hard to believe that such a pudgy, middle-aged cliché could take out a trained assassin.”
“There’s a 99.72 percent certainty. Besides, if you think about, that’s exactly who could do it. Bonney would have alerted to an obvious danger, but somebody like this Erebus wouldn’t appear much of a threat. That could have slowed down his reaction time.”
“Can the computer tell you how he got my fingerprints? Or even better, why the hell he’s doing this?” Sweetwater stared at the man’s face, searching his memories.
“Not from the jump, but then I did my thing.”
She left-clicked the mouse and a new picture appeared on the screen, that of a young red-haired girl in a baseball cap, with a ponytail hanging out the back and freckles ringing her nose.
“Her name is—”
“Grace Allen Tarbeau,” he said, his voice dropping to a stage whisper.
“Yeah, how did—”
Warden stuck out her left hand, wobbling, her eyes gone wide. Jerking her head in both directions, she grabbed Sweetwater’s arm for support with such force that he felt her nails digging into his skin.
“She’s here,” Warden said. “She’s here with us right now.”
“Who’s here with us?”
“The dead woman, Grace Allen Tarbeau, her spirit is in this room.”
Despite his own experiences, Sweetwater gave her a look that universally translated as, “Oh come on, you don’t really believe that, do you?” Meanwhile, he scanned the room just to make sure.
“I think you’re tired.”
“Fuck off, Luther. I’m not tired and I’m not extra, but I am psychic. She’s here, listening.”
“The dead woman.”
“Exactly, her newlywed husband put a contract on her and now she’s here in this room. Ain’t love grand?”
“I know about Grace Allen. I completed that contract. It’s the ‘in this room’ part I’m having trouble with.” Sweetwater looked into Warden’s eyes. “She was my first. So, what does this have to do with Erebus?”
“He’s my ex-husband,” said a voice very close to his left ear. Sweetwater jumped off the bed and whirled, leaving Warden to scowl in confusion. Behind her, Grace Allen Tarbeau was sitting across the bed, with Eamon Cooper standing near the window smoking a cigarette. Tarbeau’s skin had turned a dull black, crossed by large fissures where bloating was ripping the body open, and it hung in strips from her cheeks. Most of her hair had fallen out, but a few red strands remained. As for Cooper, his face was mostly a skull now.
“What?” Warden said. “What’s the matter?”
“Nothing. I thought I saw a spider.”
“She knows we’re here, Luther,” Cooper said. “Tell her, she’ll believe you.”
“She’s here,” Warden said. “In this room, right now. There’s a dude, too.”
“I’m a ‘dude?’” Cooper said. “I don’t feel much like a dude.”
Sweetwater closed his eyes and shook his head. “You don’t look much like a dude either, more like you’re auditioning for a Ghost Rider remake,” he said, talking to Cooper but forgetting he should be replying to Warden.
“What are you talking about?” Warden said. “I didn’t say I was a dude. And Ghost Rider sucked, why would anybody remake it?”
“Sorry, I—”
“Wait a minute…no crap, Luther, you can see them, can’t you?” Warden said. “You’re talking to them!”
“Oops,” Tarbeau said. “You done got caught.”
Sweetwater flicked his eyes at the rotted corpse on the bed, and then back to Warden. He wasn’t a man who sighed very often, but he did then.
“They aren’t real, Teri. My therapist says they’re hallucinations based on my feelings of guilt.”
“Fuck that shit, they’re every bit as real as we are. You’re a Sensitive.”
“I’m a Shooter!” he said, with more force than necessary. He hadn’t meant for it to come out that strong; it just did.
“A Sensitive Shooter.” Cooper laughed, sucking the cigarette down to the filter in fleshless lips. “That’s like being an honest politician.”
“I’m not a Sensitive,” Sweetwater said. Keeping up with a four-way conversation where Warden could only hear his part brought his headache pounding back with a vengeance. Suddenly he felt very tired. “You’re the most cynical corpse I’ve ever met.”
“Keep me in the loop, Luther,” Warden said. Something had changed in the way she looked at him. The slightly amused expression she had worn all day now showed some respect. “Stop throwing shade, I can’t hear them, but I know you can.”
“God, she’s one of those,” Tarbeau said. “Shade, what the fuck kind of talk is that?”
Sweetwater pointed at Tarbeau and scowled. “Leave her alone.”
“Or what? You gonna kill me again?”
“You said your appearances are up to me, right? That I can control them?”
“Not exactly…”
Sweetwater heard the lie in her hedging answer. “Yes, you did, that’s exactly what you said. So, here’s the deal, either you leave Teri alone and don’t hassle her, or stay in your grave and don’t come back.”
Cooper howled in amusement, a fresh cigarette burning between the bones of his fingers.
“That goes for you too, Cooper.”
“You tried to help me, Luther. I’ve got nothing against you. As for her…” He gestured at Tarbeau with his chin. “I haven’t known her very long, but I get where her husband was coming from.”
“Fuck you, Eamon,” Tarbeau said.
Sweetwater clenched his fists and leaned forward, pitching his voice loud without yelling. Red stars swam in his vision. “Go away, both of you!”
“I know when I’m not wanted,” the dead woman said.
“I’m not sure you do,” answered Cooper.
They both faded away.
Warden’s mouth hung open. Usually that would have filled Sweetwater’s brain with X-rated thoughts, but this time the headache pounded down the muscles of his neck into his shoulder blades. A cramp along his right scapula sent him leaning forward to stretch it out.
“They’re gone, aren’t they?” Warden said.
“Yeah,” he said, sitting on the other bed to face Warden. “They’re gone back to wherever dead people go…for now.”
The coffee had cooled enough to drink without blowing on it, and for a couple of minutes they did just that, without speaking. Whatever awe she felt wore off quickly, however. Warden peeked into the bag, found the carrot cake, and offered Sweetwater the first slice, which he declined. She ate the whole thing in big bites, pouring crumbs from the foam container into her mouth like the crushed chips at the bottom of a potato chip bag. Then she licked bits of creamed cheese icing off the inside top.
“Ready to talk about it?” she said, eyeing Sweetwater’s carrot cake.
“Since you obviously believe that I was really talking with two corpses, how come this doesn’t bother you more? Cooper’s been hanging around for months, and it still freaks me out.”
“First, they aren’t corpses. A corpse is the body of a dead person or animal.”
“They look like corpses. They’re even more rotten every time I see them. Cooper isn’t much more than a skeleton, and Tarbeau looks like a meat loaf.”
“You stole that from a movie.”
He sucked on the inside of his cheek. Had everybody seen that film?
“If they aren’t corpses, then, what are they?”
“Entities. Or, since you know who they are, ghosts.”
“I don’t believe in ghosts.”
“It’s probably time to start.”
“You never said why this doesn’t bother you.”
“Sure I did, you just weren’t listening. I’m a Psychic, Luther; I always have been. I can’t see entities or ghosts, but I can sense their presence, and sometimes I can communicate with them. You’re a level beyond me; you’re a Sensitive, but I’m guessing this is your first experience talking with those on the other side, right?”
“I’m not even sure there that I
believe in the other side.”
“So, who’ve you been talking to?”
“I don’t know! My head hurts.”
“Damn you’re delicate. Do all Marines need testosterone shots, or just you?”
That brought his head up.
“When I first saw you, I felt guilty because I thought you were hot but underaged, and it felt creepy. Less than twelve hours later, and you’re not so hot anymore, and I don’t give two shits how old you are.”
“There ya go,” she said, way ahead of him in knowing what was going on between them. “There’s the hothead I’ve heard about.”
“What does that mean?”
“Never mind. Let’s get back to work. You say Grace Allen Tarbeau doesn’t look so great anymore, and I believe you, but she sure as shit did in this picture. I’d hit on her, and I don’t go that way. There’s something wholesome about her, but look at those eyes—she knew just how hot she was.”
“Then how’d she wind up with a loser like Erebus?”
“I know, right? She is so far out of his league. And get this, they had a kid, a son, but he died when he was eight, under suspicious circumstances. It happened right here in Memphis and MPD investigated. They didn’t find enough evidence to charge anybody, but the cops had Erebus marked as the prime suspect. They thought he did it in some kind of rage.
“Grace Allen took off after that and headed for Texas. Then, two years ago, she married Howard Niester Tarbeau, who I think you’ve had the pleasure of meeting.”
“The piece of shit who threw her off the Renaissance Tower.”
Warden nodded. “She probably lied to Howard about her previous marriage. His family comes from old oil money, and he wouldn’t like that. So he took out a contract on her. Adrian must have figured out who completed the contract.”
“Then why did he go after Bonney first, and not me?” Sweetwater asked. “Hell, why shoot Bonney at all? It’s not like we resembled each other.”
She tapped on her teeth, eyes flicking back and forth, then stopping and meeting his gaze.
“Fuck me,” she said. Before he could make a smartass remark about having to see her ID first, Warden jumped up, punched her access code into her phone and made a call. “Wait here,” she said, then went into the bathroom.
