by B Branin
Demonic Double Cross
B. Branin
.
Copyright 2012 B. Branin
.
Dedicated to my father, the greatest man I’ve ever known.
Chapter 1
Evidence on murder, abduction, and transgressions so twisted they won’t be mentioned here, collected dust on my desk. As usual this evidence declared, with flamboyant lunacy, that yeti, ghosts and goblins were the true culprits in these savage crimes. Sitting behind these letters from whackjobs and conspiracy buffs, I cursed myself for getting into the wrong line of work.
Which line of work deserved the brunt of my anger was up to debate.
According to my borderline bogus degrees on the wall, as well as the shiny plaque on my office door, I’m officially a Paranormal Investigator. Everything from aliens to decedents of Zhu Bajie (one of the rare monsters that begin with the letter z) is fair game for my field of expertise. However anyone with a lick of sense can tell you I’m just your run of the mill conman, flimflammer, swindler, crook, and down-to-earth cheat.
Or at least I had been.
Now you can go to any used car dealership and find a cheat, but to find a true conman like myself, you gotta look pretty hard. First off, you never know a con is a con until it’s too late. Secondly, we are damn good at avoiding unwanted attention. At least that’s how it had been for me before I put together my tour-de-force scam involving the paranormal.
I first hatched my Paranormal Investigator scheme with a single goal in mind: a paycheck in exchange for zero work. With some seed money that I had left over from selling converted toasters (that steamed bread) to some health nuts, I got busy. Thanks to the glorious internet, I practically purchased a few degrees in parapsychology and psychophysics.
The con was beautifully simplistic. I make up some mumbo-jumbo about the paranormal, and then got some university professors to push it through to receive grant money in exchange for some kickbacks. We all go home happy. On occasion I’d even go perform a bogus exorcism or ghost hunt for a dirty property owner who claimed my services as a business expense/tax dodge.
Of course there were fraud investigators and government suits demanding to know that the grant money was being well spent. They could get tricky, but usually bribes or blackmail kept them out of my hair. If any particularly stubborn suit hounded me, I’d simply state that ghosts, poltergeists and other such phenomenon were not expressly specified in the Bible, Quran or what have you. That observation accompanied by a thinly veiled threat concerning a lawsuit of religious persecution got them off my back.
To sum it up, life was good.
I had enough tax dodge donations and grant money to fund a cozy lifestyle as well enough coin left over to piss away at the track or pool hall. Hell, I didn’t even mind putting up with all the crazy emails or letters I received from spiritual mediums or supposed alien abduction victims. Yup, it was great being a Paranormal Investigator... until the paranormal literally came knocking at my door.
Cleverly disguised of course.
For all of you who (God knows why) wanna become a Paranormal Investigator, here is your golden rule: Those who show up in person are dangerous! More often than not, they’ve escaped from a loony bin and need to be detained before their meds wear off. But occasionally (as my tragically long career can testify) some cases might be the real deal.
That’s right. Authentic supernatural phenomena.
That’s usually when things get…weird.
My relationship with the paranormal began on a Sunday evening. I had just woken up (painfully hung over) to discover I was at my office, using my desk as a bed. I would often make a clerical error when boozing and spend my cab fare on cheap domestics, forcing me to stumble home or to my office. It depended on which was closer to the bar I had been thrown out of.
As it turned out the pounding wasn’t just in my head, but coming from my office door. To say I was upset was an understatement. The people who usually knocked at my door were either maids who wanted me to sign up on their office building discount plan (for their prices I could get me a girl in a sexy maid outfit and then subtract the outfit) or some whip-lash victim looking for the lawyer who, for whatever reason, specialized in illiterate clients.
How else could you get Attorney At Law mixed up with Paranormal Investigator?
To my chagrin the person at my door wasn’t the usual annoyances. I threw open the door, ready to fire off several stinging barbs that reeked of liquor, when I was rendered speechless. An experience I wasn’t by any means used too. A strikingly beautiful young woman (who was about half my age, but that still made her legal by at least a year) stood outside my office. Though her figure was more than enough to ignite lust in any man, her face was so angelic I was almost ashamed to consider her a curvaceous floozy.
Let me tell you that all of her features were breathtaking, but one feature in particular held my attention. No, not those. It was her eyes! They were a mesmerizing emerald hue that held my reflection like tiny mirrors.
“You’re the investigator?” The young beauty asked, taking a step away from me (no doubt thanks to my current cologne that mixed the odors of spilt booze, vomit, and cheap skank into a graceful fragrance of offensiveness).
I was still scrambling to collect enough cognitive thought to force my tongue into action. This was my first person-to-person chat about my “career” that didn’t involve tax fraud or corrupt professors writing up a grant proposal. Trying my best to recover with what grace and tact could be salvaged, I forced a reply.
“Yeah.” I mustered.
Tactful I know…
The gal looked doubtful as she took in my ragged appearance, but any quips or comments milling about inside her mind were kept in check. Instead the young lady cleared her throat nervously, her skepticism just about to propel her as far away from me as possible.
“How does one…” She asked, those emerald irises full of uncertainty, “Hire you, exactly?”
There were only two things that could instantly bring out the best in me; one was a loaded gun and the other was money. The thought of greenbacks slapping against my palm immediately expelled my hangover and brought back some of my articulate nimbleness. Offering her my most charming smile, I waved her into my office. She hesitated a few moments before accepting my invitation but who could fault her for that?
“Well there are several ways to go about it,” I explained as if I were the authority on the subject of investigation negotiation, “As my services are unique, so are my payment methods. Compensation can vary from the expenses needed to the results I find.”
With a dancer’s grace, I guided my potential client through the small mounds of trash that haphazardly occupied my office floor (I made a mental note to actually listen to the maids next time they offered their services) and over to my desk that, moments before, had been my bunk. Once we were both seated I tried to appear as presentable as possible, operating purely on greed and instincts developed over years of swindling.
Looking back on it now, it never occurred to me how I might have falsified a paranormal investigation. Unfortunately for me, there was no falsification needed in this particular case. If there had been, it would have saved me much bodily harm, all of my sanity and countless sleepless nights. Instead, I said the dumbest thing I could to the sweet young woman seated across from me as I extended my hand to her.
“The name’s Arthur Broker. Paranormal Investigator.”
