“What brings you here at the crack of dawn?” Sage asked Brody.
Mike shook his head as he got out eggs and bacon. “I take it we have company.”
“Got it in one,” Sage told him while waiting for Brody to reply.
“Kurt took some pictures we thought you might be interested in, especially Mike,” Brody said.
When Sage repeated that for Mike, the detective said, “Dare I ask what they are?”
“Some group photos of the six of us,” Kurt said, and Sage relayed.
“Seriously?” Mike asked. “That’s possible? Okay, I guess it must be. Let’s see.”
Kurt held up his camera. “I have to download them to Van’s laptop, or your computer.” He shrugged. “Your choice.”
When Sage repeated what Kurt had said, Mike suggested he use the laptop. “While we eat. I have to leave pretty soon.”
The ghosts immediately went into the office. Brody booted up the laptop, found Van’s photo manipulation program, then moved so Kurt could do his thing. It took him a while, but in the end Kurt was satisfied that the ones he’d chosen showed the ghosts as well as was possible, considering they were ghosts.
By then, Mike and Sage had finished eating and came into the office. As they watched, Kurt scrolled through the pictures until Mike asked him to stop at one.
“Obviously, I know what Brody looks like because I knew him, and I’ve seen photos of everyone else, but seeing you like this? It gives me a real visual of what you’re like today. Is it possible to print this one off so we have a copy?”
“Sure, if we hitch printer up to the laptop,” Kurt replied, and Sage repeated.
Mike did, and then made two copies of the photo, one for him and Sage and one for the ghosts. Kurt bemoaned the fact he didn’t have photo paper for them, but all-in-all was happy with the result.
After thanking Kurt for taking the photos, and asking him to send them all to his email, Mike said, “I’m going to do what I can to contact people who worked with Ogden Reed. Hopefully, as I said on Saturday, I can get some of them to talk with me. It’s been long enough since he died that a couple of them might be willing to, and then it will just be a case of whether he said anything to them about Irwin being responsible for Jon’s murder.”
“You managed it when you got Cal Turner to admit that he had Stryker kill me,” Brody pointed out.
When Sage told Mike what Brody had said, he replied, “I had something to offer him, since he was in prison and coming up for parole. He was willing to talk in exchange for my putting in a good word for him when that happened. I doubt I’ll be as lucky with Reed’s associates.”
“But you might be,” Jon said hopefully.
“Yeah, maybe,” Mike replied when Sage relayed Jon’s words. “That said, I really do have to get out of here. They kind of like it if I show up on time.” Mike paused long enough to kiss Sage goodbye and took off.
“I need to go, too,” Sage told the ghosts before he left the office. “I’ll let you know the moment Mike finds out anything.”
“And then there were six,” Van said. “Unfortunately, there’s nothing we can do at the moment as far as researching Jon’s murder. We know everything that happened, or presumably happened.”
“True,” Brody said as he took the chair Kurt had vacated in front of Van’s laptop. “But…” He opened a folder titled ‘Games’ and grinned. “We can play one of these.”
“Good grief,” Jon muttered. It didn’t stop him from seeing what the folder had to offer. There were several, some of them ones he and Brody used to play.
“Those are on my laptop, too,” Gene told them. “So two of you can play together online. Van and I used to, when we needed a break from writing.”
Kurt immediately turned Gene’s laptop on and after he gave him the password he went looking. “We’ll team up,” he said when he and Brody settled on a game. “I play with Tonio and Gene’s input, you do the same with you, Jon, and Van, and—” he grinned, “—I bet we win.”
“You’re on,” Brody replied gleefully.
Several hours later, Kurt’s team ruefully ceded defeat. “This time,” he said. “We’ll come back tomorrow and try again.”
Van laughed. “Not quite the way we expected to be using our time here, but it works.”
* * * *
Between a new case, and several ongoing ones, Mike didn’t have time to do anything about locating people who had worked with Ogden Reed in his drug-dealing business until after he signed out for the day. He called Sage to let him know he’d be home late and then began searching for names, starting by talking with two of the detectives who worked narcotics.
“Names, I can give you,” one of them said when Mike explained he wanted to close the file on Jon’s murder, which was now considered a cold case. “Finding the men after all this time is another thing.” He tapped the list he had in his files on Reed. “This man is serving time with no chance of parole. These two are dead, which is no loss to society. Davis and Peck are still in the business, thanks to damned good lawyers who get them off whenever they’re picked up.”
“Name of the game, unfortunately,” Mike said dourly. “Thanks for the help.”
“What little there was of it,” the detective replied. “Good luck. You’re going to need it.”
“No shit.”
Mike decided he should start with Davis. Like Irwin and Reed, he had begun as a street dealer for Mr. North, one of the top men running drugs in the city. While Irwin had remained lower echelon, Reed had moved up the ladder to become a major distributor for North, with Irwin and Davis working directly under him. Because Peck, the second man on the list, was allied with North the same way Reed had been, as one of his distributors, Mike had the feeling he’d be less likely to open up to him about Reed.
As it turned out, Mike was wrong, which he found out on Tuesday, when he had arranged to trade days with another detective so he could spend his time looking for Davis and Peck.
He ran Davis down at what a street informant told him was Davis’s usual hangout—a twenty-four-hour club on the fringes of downtown that he owned. The man was seated at a table with three other men. It was obvious when he saw Mike approaching that he fingered him as a cop because he said something to the men and they moved to the bar.
“What do you want?” Davis asked when Mike pulled out one of the chairs and sat.
“To ask you a couple of questions,” Mike replied. “Nothing to do with why you’re here.”
“I’m here to enjoy a couple of beers with friends,” Davis said.
“I’ll take your word for it. I’m interested in someone you used to know. Ogden Reed.”
“Never heard of him.”
“That’s not what I’ve been told. According to my source, you used to work for him.” Mike leaned in, adding quietly, “As one of his dealers. Before you start denying it, at the moment I don’t particularly care. All I want to know is if he told you anything about another of his…employees. One Thomas Irwin.”
“Never heard of him, either.”
“You’re certain? Before you deny it, again, I’m looking at Irwin for a murder that happened a couple of years ago. From what I understand, Reed wasn’t happy about it and when Irwin killed again, he decided he was a loose cannon and eliminated him, permanently.”
Davis shrugged, taking a drink of his beer. “Shit happens but like I said, I don’t know either of them so I couldn’t say.”
Mike glanced around to make certain no one was paying them any real attention before gripping Davis’s wrist. “You help me, I’ll help you if you run into any problems you can’t handle on your own, like with the police.”
“Now why would the police be interested in me?” Davis asked, pulling free of Mike’s grip. “I’m just a guy trying to earn an honest buck running my club. I follow the laws, don’t serve booze between two P.M. and eight A.M., make sure my employees take a patron’s car keys if they’re too drunk.” He smiled broadly. “I’m an all-
around good guy who gives people a safe place to hang out with their friends.”
“So if I decided we needed to raid the place I wouldn’t find any drugs?”
“That sounds like a threat. I don’t take kindly to being threatened, especially by a cop who is fishing for information I don’t have. I suggest you leave.”
Mike nodded, getting up. He knew he wasn’t going to learn anything from Davis, no matter how hard he pushed it. He was tempted to carry through on his threat, just for the hell of it, but was well aware that if he did the narcotics squad would come up empty since he’d as much as warned Davis it could happen.
* * * *
Mike stopped for lunch so he could regroup after his failure with Davis. He didn’t hold out much hope for doing any better with Peck, but he wasn’t going to give up until he talked with the man. Peck owned a used furniture company. It was, Mike knew, a front for his real job working as one of North’s distributors. The average citizen had no idea that the men making furniture deliveries also dropped off drugs to Peck’s street dealers. If one of them was arrested, which happened on occasion, Peck denied any knowledge of what they’d been doing, and the men who got caught knew it was more than their lives were worth to rat him out. In exchange for keeping quiet, their families were well taken care of until they were released from prison.
All that was common knowledge within the police force, but as with so much else that went on when it came to drug crimes, knowing and proving were too often two different things unless someone went undercover the way Brody had. And look what happened to him.
When Mike walked into Peck’s store his first thought was, The ghostie boys could use some of this stuff, if they had room for it. Even though the furniture was used, it was a definite step up from most of what was in the loft at the barn.
One of the sales men came over to ask if he could help him.
“I’d like to speak with Mr. Peck, if he’s in,” Mike replied.
“Are you a salesman?”
Mike had the feeling if he said he was the man would tell him Peck wasn’t available. “No. I knew an old friend of his, first name Read, spelled with an ‘A,’ and thought I’d touch base while I was in the neighborhood.” Read Ogden was the name on the driver’s license found on Ogden Reed when he died. When the man started to protest, Mike said flatly, “Just deliver the message.”
The man gave a nod before walking to a door at the side of the showroom. He knocked and entered. A few moments later he returned, telling Mike that Mr. Peck was willing to see him.
When Mike entered the room, Peck gestured him to a seat, saying, after studying him, “You’re the man responsible for eliminating Ogden Reed.”
“I suppose you could put it that way,” Mike replied warily, unsure if Peck was upset or not. “It was him or me.”
“From what I understand, it was almost you. Congratulations on surviving. Now, why are you here?”
“Not for the reason you probably think. I’m with homicide, not narcotics,” Mike replied. Peck’s only response was a nod and a slight darkening of his expression, so Mike continued. “I was in the process of investigating the murder of a young man, Jon Watts, who had met one Thomas Irwin at a club a month before he died. Then Grant Newton, a man connected to Watts and Irwin, was murdered by Irwin. I located Irwin and intended on arresting him at the rooming house where he was hiding out. You’re obviously aware of what happened. Reed shot Irwin, then me. I returned fire and he died.”
“You had proof Irwin killed both men?”
“No, only Newton, which is why I’m here. My supposition, and I think I’m right, is that Reed killed Irwin because he had become unreliable. Two murders in less than a week would not have been good for business.”
“Why did you wait this long to get in contact with me, and how do you think I can help?” Peck asked.
“It’s always bothered me that I couldn’t say for certain Irwin killed Watts, since everyone involved is dead. So, I thought maybe, since from what I understand you and Reed were friends, he might have said something to you about Irwin.”
Peck smiled dryly. “We had a working arrangement, nothing more. One I wasn’t too happy about, but that’s neither here nor there. If you’re asking, did Reed mention he thought Irwin was, how shall I put this, overzealous in protecting his interests, he did. That happened the night he found out that Irwin had shot Newton and gone on the run.”
“Did he happen to say specifically that Irwin had also killed Watts?” Mike asked, praying he had.
“He did. To be honest, he was angrier about that than Newton’s death, even though neither man had anything to do with him or Irwin, other than the fact they all met at a club one night. Apparently Reed was sure Watts had taken pictures of him and Irwin. He told Irwin to get them, even if it meant stealing his phone. He did not order him to kill Watts, or so he said.”
“You believed him?”
Peck shrugged. “I had no reason not to.” He paused, looking hard at Mike. “If you expect me to make an official statement about this, I won’t. You’ll just have to take my word for it that Reed told me Irwin murdered Watts.”
“That’s enough, as far as I’m concerned. The case was closed after Irwin and Reed’s deaths. If they were still alive, I’d do everything in my power to make you testify to what Reed told you so that Irwin would be tried for Watt’s murder. Now, it’s a moot point. As I said to start with, it’s bothered me that I couldn’t prove Irwin killed Watts. Now, though it’s not official, I know the truth, thanks to you.”
Peck chuckled. “So you can sleep easy, finally.”
Smiling, Mike replied, “I suppose you could put it that way. Thank you for talking with me.”
“I could say it was my pleasure, and I suppose in a way it was. I’m always willing to help the police when it doesn’t impact me…personally.”
“Understood,” Mike said as he stood and left the office. Now I have to hope what I learned is enough to allow Jon to move on—and hope that he doesn’t for Brody’s sake. After all, as one of them said, there’s no guarantee that they would end up together if that happened.
* * * *
The ghosts, all of them, had returned to Sage and Mike’s townhouse late Tuesday morning to continue their gaming marathon. After a couple of intense hours on one game, they took a break to recuperate while Kurt crowed that his ‘team’ had beaten Brody’s hands-down.
Brody had laughed, then suggested they try another game, with Jon and Tonio doing the work on the laptops while the others urged them on.
They had finally reached level five and Jon’s character was in the process of trying to sneak up on one of the enemies when, without warning, he vanished.
“Fuck,” Brody exclaimed, torn between being happy that Mike must have gotten the proof they needed that Irwin had murdered Jon, and distraught that Jon was moving on without him.
“Brody, he’ll be back. You know he will,” Tonio said adamantly, hugging his friend.
“To quote what a wonderful man said, when he returned, ‘You can look, but don’t touch.’ Jon smiled brightly as he appeared beside Brody.
“Yes!” Tonio pumped a fist as he stepped back, allowing Jon to take over.
Jon wrapped his arms around Brody, murmuring, “You knew I wouldn’t leave you,” before kissing him soundly.
When they parted, Brody was able to reply, “I knew in my heart, but in my mind, when you disappeared…”
“I would never leave you,” Jon told him emphatically. “Not now, not ever. Hell, I wouldn’t leave any of you,” he added, sweeping his arm around. “Although honestly, you’re secondary to why I did come back. This man,” he looked at Brody with love, “and what I feel for him gave me the strength to resist the pull.”
“Meaning we’re stuck with you, like it or not?” Kurt asked, grinning.
“You bet you are,” Jon replied, at the same time Brody’s phone rang.
Brody read the text from Mike and returned it with four wo
rds. We know. Thank you! When he hung up he put his arm protectively around Jon as he said, “It was just as we thought. Reed killed Irwin because he’d murdered Jon and Grant, according to someone who knew Reed.”
“Case closed,” Jon said, leaning into Brody’s embrace. “Probably not officially because whoever it was who talked to Mike won’t give a…a what? A deposition, I guess, since it would implicate him in Reed and Irwin’s drug dealings.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” Van said. “What counts, though, is that you know.”
“Exactly,” Jon agreed. He kissed Brody again then said, “Now, where were we before I was so unceremoniously dragged away from the game?”
That got laughs from everyone before Jon and Tonio got back to trying to beat level five while the others kibitzed.
Chapter 7
A month passed, during which life got back to normal—or as normal as it could be for six ghosts sharing quarters in the loft of an abandoned barn. With Sage and Mike’s permission, they spent time at the townhouse during the day, either on the laptops or watching television.
Slowly, Van and Gene began to be able to move things. Small ones at first—a pencil, the sheets of paper they used to work on an outline for another of their mysteries.
“Not that we’ll be able to publish it,” Van grumped at one point. “But at least we’re writing again.”
By the end of the month, they were able to manipulate the keys on their laptops. At that point their story took off as they worked on Van’s laptop; letting the others use Gene’s for gaming, much to Brody’s relief.
* * * *
“What do you think?” Sage asked, tapping the screen.
“It would be great, if we were millionaires.”
“Picky, picky.” Sage kept scrolling.
“This one isn’t bad,” Mike said, putting his hand over Sage’s to stop him from moving on.
Sage read the description, nodding slowly. “Refurbished kitchen with all new appliances, two bedrooms with en suite baths, a room off the living-dining area that could be an office, a nice big yard, and—” he paused, smiling, “—a carriage house.”
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