by J K Ellem
Following the path at the rear of the guest house, he made his way down towards the beach. A hundred yards later the path stopped at a low panel fence that ran the entire length of the rear of the property. The fence was intended to keep out unwelcome visitors, but Shaw doubted it was capable of keeping anyone out except maybe a stray small dog or lost toddler.
The fence was 4ft high and made from high tensile hollow aluminum. It had vertical tubes with a simple top and bottom square rail and the panels were attached to evenly spaced light-weight posts. Despite being powder coated, the fence showed signs of deterioration and neglect. There were white streaks of corrosion in places and some of the weld joints were cracked and flakey. The sea air, rain and cold Long Island winters had all taken their toll.
Shaw would have much preferred seeing an 8ft security fence at the rear of the estate to prevent anyone just walking straight off the beach and into the property. Maybe the local ordnance rules didn’t allow anything more robust so as to keep within the aesthetic of the natural surrounds.
A self-closing gate in the fence was partially open. Bending down he examined the closing mechanism and the lock. The springs were dry and rusty and hadn’t been lubricated in years. The salt air had also corroded the locking plate and the hinges protested when Shaw opened and closed the gate a few times. Screws were missing from the hinges causing the gate to hang off-kilter; the reason why it wouldn’t close securely.
“Great.” Shaw stood up again.
Following the fence line north, Shaw passed another access gate that also wouldn’t lock properly along with several misaligned fence panels where the posts had sunk into the loose sandy soil. The fencing contractor had skimped on installing the post foundations properly by digging shallow holes and pouring concrete around the posts.
Emerging from the undergrowth, Shaw found himself back at the swimming pool area again and noticed a gardener raking leaves off a section of lawn near the pool cabana.
The man looked up as Shaw approached. Shaw asked him his name.
“Gomez, sir.”
“Don’t call me “sir” Gomez,” Shaw replied, a little angry, not at the man but at what he had found from walking the fence line. Maybe it was old habits from his past, but Shaw believed that a fence had a purpose, no matter how big or small: to keep someone in or keep someone out. Otherwise why bother installing one? “How long have you been working here, Gomez?”
The man leaned on his rake, looking confused. Shaw understood and qualified his question. “Don’t worry, Gomez, you’re not in trouble. I just want to know about the grounds around the estate.”
Gomez smiled, the relief obvious. “Three years, sir.”
Shaw gave a warning glare at Gomez.
“Sorry…three years I’ve been working for the Brenner Family.”
Shaw nodded. “And in that time have any handymen been doing any work on the property, you know, maintenance work?”
Gomez made a show of thinking. “Before Mr. Brenner disappeared, there was a maintenance man who looked after the place, a contractor, if major things needed fixing. But no one has been here for a while. I guess there is no need. Everything looks fine.”
Everything looks fine indeed, Shaw thought. “What about the fences and gates?”
“There was a security company that Mr. Brenner hired just before he disappeared,” Gomez added.
“Go on.”
“They installed the new fence at the rear of the property and I believe they also installed a new intercom access system at the main gate, and some external security cameras.”
Shaw thanked the man and made his way to the front driveway. He used his key to unlock the gatehouse door. Thankfully that door was installed properly and was in good working order. Next to the automatic gates on one brick column sat an intercom panel with a fisheye video camera and a keypad below. Shaw gently shook it. The panel was loose and crumbly mortar fell from behind the mounting plate.
He let out a breath of frustration as a swarm of ants suddenly spiraled out from behind the panel. He could squeeze his fingers behind the entire front panel of the intercom and a few wires poked out from the sides as he pulled it forward. Common household screws were drilled straight in, instead of using proper masonry screws with concrete anchors to fasten it to the brickwork. There was also no weather-proof seal around the housing, allowing insects and the rain to get in.
Shaw doubted if the thing still worked. Or ever worked.
A gate motor housed in a small plastic box sat on the ground next to the guide rail, the name of the security company and their phone number proudly displayed on a sticker on the side.
He noted the details and headed back to the main house.
10
She would wait until dark, less chance of being seen.
Annie sat on a canvas chair on the back deck of her cottage, her bare feet resting on the rail. She wore a light cotton shirt, and well-worn cargo shorts. A light westerly breeze pulled at the strands of her hair. With a glass of red wine in one hand she watched the ocean turn the color of molten lead as the sun rippled and sank slowly into the Atlantic. A lone sailing boat, sails in full bloom, foam breaking across its bow, cut a bee-line towards the shore to where the boat harbor lay beyond the curve of the coastline. Apart from a woman walking her dog, the beach was deserted.
Annie loved this time of the day when the sun dipped and the ocean breeze picked up, the air bracing, refreshing, but not cold enough for her to put on a pullover.
Shadows slowly spread amongst the dunes in time-lapse, beach grass swayed and ruffled, the earth grew cold and the sand turned gray.
Annie sat thinking about what Edith Plover had said about the Ballards. Annie was certain she had seen lights up there a few nights ago. Annie had gone for a walk along the beach just after dusk. Behind her the stretch of coastline twinkled with pockets of light. She came off the beach and made her way inland, following a trail among the dunes she must have trod a thousand times.
Dark mounds, mournful and lonely, surrounded her, the air brisk and salty. Ahead she could see the bright lights of the massive estates along the beach road. She cut back along the road toward the base of the cliffs on the opposite side. It was then she happened to glance up at the cliff top. In the cloudless, star-filled darkness, she saw what she thought was a blade of light up around the base of the Ballard mansion. It lasted only a few seconds but it looked like someone was walking around the outside of the property with a flashlight.
She wasn’t imagining it. And it definitely wasn’t “strange lights in the night sky” as Edith Plover had said Ralph Jacobson had mentioned.
Annie took a sip of wine, taking a moment to savor the velvety earthiness of the grapes for a moment in her mouth before swallowing and enjoying the gradual spread of warmth inside her.
She felt good, grounded, content here, in her secluded cottage by the ocean. It was her little slice of paradise that she closely guarded and would protect if needed. She just wanted to be left alone, forget the past.
Surely, they wouldn’t find her here.
She had changed her appearance, dyed her hair. Her once pale city skin was now the shade of wild honey from the endless hours spent outdoors on the beach. She had walked, run and exercised away at least fifteen pounds of her former self.
It was easier than what she had thought to change her name, to adopt a whole new identity. With enough money you could buy yourself practically anything including a new life. She could have lived anywhere in the world, any city or town of her choosing. Little did she know that she would end up just a few miles away from where she had once lived in the big city. She felt no fear of this fact. For Annie, it made sense. They would be looking for her further away, monitoring all airports and sea ports perhaps, expecting her to have left the country. She had contemplated it, leaving the country. Her new passport had cost her $10,000. Small change. It was amazing what one could find for sale on the Internet, services that were offered if you knew where to
look.
France sounded nice. She had always wanted to live there, in Paris, spend her lazy days walking along the Seine admiring the beautiful architecture, the cathedrals, the historic bridges, the countless art galleries and museums, to dine in little street side bistros then spend her evenings drinking wonderful wine. She would blend in and disappear in the fabric of that beautiful city.
She had friends in Berlin, another city she also wanted to experience. But they wouldn’t recognize her now and she certainly didn’t want to put them in danger if the others found her.
She had severed ties with all of her friends in New York City, had to. They were probably watching them as well.
The burning ball of the sun slipped further beneath the waves and Annie was brought back to the task at hand and the niggling in her mind. It would be fully dark in another hour and, when it was, Annie intended to dress appropriately and venture out into the darkness again. If there was a caretaker looking after the Ballard mansion, then why would he be poking around the property at night?
Any other person would have just ignored it, put it down to nothing to be worried about. Annie had tried to convince herself of just that. But it was playing on her mind. Annie was a naturally curious person and there something about what she saw that didn’t feel right.
After placing the wine glass in the kitchen sink, she went to the bedroom. She rolled back a rug to reveal the bare floor boards. Using a pen knife she levered two of the floor boards of the several she had specially installed to be removed easily. From the cavity beneath she withdrew a small object and laid it on the floor. She paused for a moment looking at the small wooden box that contained her past life. Until now she had been hesitant to do what she needed to do, the final step in her cleansing. But now it was time. It felt right, to let go, to be finally free.
She carried the box to the kitchen, grabbed a bottle of lighter fluid from the cupboard under the sink, and a box of matches.
Outside, she made her way down behind the cottage and through the dunes to where a rusted 44 gallon drum sat in the sand. In winter she loved sitting out here under the stars. She would fill the drum with driftwood she had gathered along the beach, set it on fire and spend hours just watching the flames, the sparks and cinders spiral upwards into the darkness. In the firelight she would think about what she had done, her past life. For Annie, fire meant cleansing, erasing, setting yourself free. It also meant life, to be reborn, a new start.
There was already some driftwood and kindling in the drum. Annie squirted a good stream of lighter fluid on the wood before tossing in a match. The wood ignited in a burst of heat and flame, the air rippled and shimmered. Annie felt the heat caress her face and neck, warming her cold shoulders and arms. The wind picked up and a few stars poked through the indigo veil, the sun all but gone.
She opened the small keepsake box and looked inside. There was a driver's license, a birth certificate and passport. She opened the passport to the main page with her photo. A face stared back at her, no smile, a slight frown perhaps, a face that she almost didn’t recognize now. But it was her face, or how she had once looked.
For the very last time she read the name beneath the photo: Jennifer Ashleigh Ryan. Annie looked at the face one more time before closing the passport, and tossing it along with the other items and the box into the billowing flames.
She stood for a moment, watching the flames take hold then turned and walked back to her cottage, the darkness pressing in around her.
She returned to her bedroom, knelt down again at the gap in the floor, removed two more floorboards and reached in further, making sure they were still there, safely hidden.
Inside the cavity were two bags. The smaller of the two was a tactical gun bag. Inside this was another handgun and two hundred rounds of ammunition. The other, larger bag was her “go bag”; an Osprey daypack that contained everything she needed if she simply had to go, run, get out of the cottage, leave without looking back. Inside the daypack was a change of clothes, her new passport, driver’s license, a small first-aid kit, spare credit and debit cards in other names, $5,000 in cash and some other essentials to keep her safe on the run until she could regroup and assess. Sensible Prepper, a channel on YouTube had been a big help in formulating her plans.
In a side pocket of the daypack was a small notebook and pen. Hidden on the pages amongst what looked like lines of “gibberish” was a sequence of meaningless numbers, meaningless to anyone except Annie. She already memorized the sequence of numbers, the notebook just a back-up. The numbers were the account codes to access three bank accounts: one in the Cayman Islands, another in the tiny municipality of Lichtenstein, Germany, the third in Hong Kong.
The sum total of all the accounts was slightly more than $10 million.
Annie Haywood, part-time librarian, full-time fugitive, was not going to go broke anytime soon.
11
Back at the guest house Shaw opened his rucksack and took out a note book. He opened it to the middle double page and began to sketch. What he drew wasn’t to scale but was extremely detailed and all from memory. Fifteen minutes later he sat back and regarded his artistry.
Not bad.
He found Abby in the huge garage. The panel doors were up and she was wiping down the Mustang with a cloth. Parked to one side was a BMW sedan and a pick-up truck.
He handed her the piece of paper.
“What’s this?” she said unfolding it. “Your phone number?”
“It’s a map of the estate,” Shaw replied. “I’ve marked on there all the weak points in the security, where things are either broken or soon will be.”
Abby gave Shaw a puzzled look. “We have a security company that takes care of that.”
“Apparently not, or not good enough.”
“Why the concern? Nothing has happened in years.”
Shaw didn’t smile. “It’s just what I do,” he replied, trying not to sound authoritative. After all, it was her place and he was just a guest. “I just want to make sure you’re safe.”
Abby felt a slight pang in her chest and looked at the map again. She was touched by what he had done.
“If you bother to have security around here then it might as well be up to standard.” Shaw added. “I wrote down the contact details of the contractor on there too, found it on the gate motor. You might want to give them a call.”
Abby folded the sketch and slipped it into her back pocket then looked at Shaw. He was standing close to her, real close. She could feel her skin bristle, a sudden clamminess in her mouth, a twist of affection in her chest as she looked at him, up close. He was taller than her which she liked. He had a rough, weathered look, defined cheek bones, dark piercing eyes. He had a confident understated aura, but not brash or cocky like most guys in these parts. But there was something else, something that had spooked Teddy Hanson. Shaw had the persona and the look of someone in control, no matter what. But he gave off the vibe that his self-control could become unhinged at any moment and he could become a completely different person. This only added to the mystery about him that made him even more alluring to Abby. “I’ll call the contractor today and see if they could come out tomorrow and take a look. It was something I hadn’t considered. My mother and I had always felt safe here on the estate.”
She reached up and kissed Shaw on the cheek, something he didn’t expect but he didn’t rebuke either. “I’m glad you’re here.”
Shaw nodded, didn’t smile and walked away.
Annie changed into black running tights, a black long sleeve running top over a dark T-shirt and slipped on a pair of trail running shoes. If anyone questioned her she would just be out on a night run along the cliff tops. She zipped a compact flashlight into a pocket and thought better of taking a gun. It would compromise the innocence of her appearance.
She locked the cottage behind her, leaving on just the porch light.
She parked her car in the shadows in the picnic area at the base of the cliffs, away from
the solitary light pole in the parking lot then made the rest of the way on foot.
Thirty minutes later she found herself at the top of the cliffs. It was a cloudless night the moon lit the black surface of the ocean below in a wedge of shimmering white. Annie stood in the tree line, catching her breath. Hill running was not part of her fitness routine.
She had stayed off the main road that led up to the cliff edge, preferring to take one of several hiking trails that ran from the base, through the scrub and trees and up to the top.
The dark edge of the coastline was outlined with lights and she could see clearly the row of ocean front estates below her. A narrow cone of light tracked slowly out to sea, before sweeping inland again as the beam of the lighthouse on Moors Island rotated lazily. The lighthouse was shrouded in ghostly wisps of mist as a bank of fog moved slowly in from the ocean.
Maybe two hundred yards further along the cliff edge Annie could make out the silhouette of the Ballard mansion, a cutout shape of angles, sharp rooflines and jutting turrets, all set against a velvet background of stars. The mansion was in total darkness, no lights, no signs of life. The driveway stretched back down the hillside towards the main road that wound its way back to the base of the cliffs. Annie thought about turning back, retreating to the warmth of her cottage, sitting in front of the fireplace and finishing the bottle of merlot that was waiting for her, and forgetting this fool’s errand.
But then she would not sleep, her mind would be restless, wondering if what she had seen was just her imagination or something more.
The distant sound of waves crashing on the beach below floated up to her as she watched and waited, making certain she was alone. Satisfied she was, Annie eased out from among the trees. A few moments later she was crouched behind an outer wall of brick and vine that ran the entire length of one side. Annie thought about scaling the wall but what would happen if someone was inside? She would be charged with trespass, this was private property.
