Su Kills

by Sam Wilson

  “Hello love” followed by the customary kiss

  “Hi honey, how was your day” and the dance continues.

  It was easy exiting the front door and crossing over to the tube station, the noise, people swarming as bees in a mad rush to catch the tube to work or coming back from a night shift, you can see the drowsiness in their eyes. The funniest part is, their faces are all buried in ipads, iphones, metros, and sun newspapers, the tube was packed like sardines, but no one seem to be aware of the other. Two well-suited banker types with too much cologne wedged Dominic Peren in close to the exit; he caught his breath when he exited at Westminster station in transit to catch the Jubilee line tube to Waterloo station, what a tedious journey. As usual the day was typical, analyzing data and shifting through files upon files, at 12:00 pm he couldn’t go out for the usual lunch break but that was Okay since Lily is on a business trip to Malta. She dropped that sudden bomb on him during dinner last night. Something about the house he visited yesterday bugged him, something that lay among the scattered metal and wires on the table in the second kitchen, located right from the hall triggered his memory minutes before he fell asleep. Part of his job as an annalist is to spot what others wouldn’t, after work he headed north instead of the customary south. An hour later, shaded in shadow under an umbrella tree in a public park nearby, Dominic waited patiently for dark, the perfect time to come out. 23:00 sharp, he came out of hiding and headed to the back of the house, making sure along the way not to be seen. The lights in the house were all switch off except the one in the hallway, surprisingly the sliding door was left unlocked, he slide it shot as quickly as possible then predatorily waited and listened before taking a step towards the first kitchen leading to the hallway. The second kitchen was pitch dark till the flash light illuminated the large room containing a six person dinning table in the middle, two large combined fridges located on opposite sides of the room and the kitchen unit situated on the far right. The kitchen was squeaky clean, not even a crust of bread or dust rested anywhere the flashlight lit up. A noise in form of a crack made by a door opening, startled him, he thought he heard footsteps coming toward his direction and instinctively moved to the left, away from view. But the individual whoever it was went the opposite direction into a smaller room, he or she closed the door and switched on the light then it went dead and Dominic breath an air of relief. He rested his head back wards against the wall and felt it open; he staggered back but steadied himself by grabbing the door handle, the flashlight came back to life and revealed a garage turned into a work room. Five minutes went by in a flash and nothing resembling what he thought he saw was hidden in anything he had looked into, ten more minutes of looking resulted in nothing and his patients was running out,

  “My mind most be playing tricks on me”

  He thought out loud, not sure of what exactly he was looking for. The lights in the kitchen was switched on, it shone through the key-hole and the opening under the door, he quickly switched the flashlights off and hide under a greasy work table close to the shutter. The person entered the garage/work room switching the main light on, she, as it turned out to be, drew closer to the shutter and climbed on a small ladder in order to get hold of a box on the top shelf. He came out just as she let the door swing close on its own and saw the man and her were naked, something stroke him, she is different. A minute after they left, others came into the kitchen, he counted four in order of voices then again there could be more, they spoke an Eastern European dialect he couldn’t place. Peaks through the keyhole gave a few he hadn’t bargained for, they were all naked, five men and six women including the two he thought had vacated the room, sitting around the dinning table putting things together, it looked like they were having supper. What they are making he can’t possibly make out but surely it’s not going to end well if they catch him hiding out in their garage, the only plan is to crawl back into hiding and do what he does best and that is wait. Hours past before he crawled back out, the time revealed he had lightly slept for three hours and has to be at work in another four hours. Alert has anyone can be at this hour, he stepped out of the garage and got a rude awakening, in front of him is the naked woman holding the box of electrical wires in her right hand and her left directly on his chest. A surprise look followed by a muffled scream and a light crash, he couldn’t believe what he was doing, looking into her eyes and his hands around her throat, stopped her from calling for help, the box dropped to the floor, landing softly, it hardly made any noise. It took close to five minutes before she was resting against him unconscious; he carried her into the garage and laid her on the greasy table, a finger close her nose confirmed she was still alive then he covered her up in a blue dirty blanket he found on the racks. He easily left the house without any other obstacles and got home at five-thirty, after a quick shower he was on the district line (tube line) at 6:00 heading towards Westminster station hunted by the woman’s frightful face. Three day on, he hadn’t have a proper sleep, his mind drove him almost to the point of madness with guilt, he thought about giving himself up to the police. He checked the newspapers daily but there weren’t any reports about a woman been found dead in north London, after another distracted and migraine filled workday he came home to find lily preparing for their normal ritual. He welcomed the familiarity and wished to pour out his guilt but he knew he couldn’t, he hugged her when he saw her, something he hasn’t done for a long while. She was taking back but held on to him tightly, they remained in the sudden and obviously needed warm embrace for a minute or two before separating to have dinner.

  “You look very happy to see me my love. Missed me, have you?” she asked amused

  “Yes honey, I missed you. Glad you are home” his reply wasn’t entirely honest and she new it and so did he.

  “What have you been up to while I was gone”

  “Oh, the usual boring stuff, nothing interesting to talk about, how was your trip?”

  “Well my trip wasn’t as boring as your work only filled life, I can tell you that much” she chuckled

  “Tell me more, what happened over there, did you meet some interesting people?

  “Yes, a lot of interesting people, that is one of the advantages of working in sales besides the killings” she said killings while shoveling a piece of chicken in her mouth.

  Dominic nearly choked on mashed up chicken stock in his throats.

  “Killings?” he asked coughing and eyes puffed up red.

  Lily stood up with concern and ran to his aid, a hand on his back she asked.

  “Are you alright?”

  “Yes honey, I’m fine, please go back to your sit?”

  She stood beside him for a few seconds then returned to her sit.

  “What just happen there?”

  “Nothing to worry about, a piece of bone got stock in my throat. That is all?” an obvious lie, he could tell by the look on her face that she doesn’t believe him and she has stopped believing him for a long time but the feeling is mutual “Please continue with what you were saying”

  “Did something happen while…?”

  He cut her off.

  “Nothing happened, stop with the worry” trying to wave the thought from her mind.

  “Ok let’s forget about it”

  “Good idea, let’s finish dinner”

  “Fine” she sounded a little annoyed

  They ate in silence for the rest of the dinner and after serving desert, as if a light bulb suddenly flashed on, she broke the silence and said

  “You know, talking about killing, have you red the evening standard?”

  “Evening standard? No I’ve not” he replied curious

  “There is this story about a woman found this morning naked in a park under an umbrella tree, she had been strangled with a dirty rag over her head. In other words, asphyxia by strangulation”

  He did not say anything but had his hand over his mouth listening intensively to every word coming out of her mouth. She removed the Evening standard
out of her bag and handed it to him as she continued.

  “You hear news like this all the time but I brought this one up because the girl is a dead ringer for me except for the dyed blond hair, as a brunette we will be regarded as twins. Don’t you think?”

  He sat across from her in a state of shock and not to look suspicious when she asked him the question he managed to muster a sentence.

  “Come to think of it, she does look like you as a sister. Twins, is a bit far fetched?

  She stared at him in disbelief and continued with the paper’s analysis.

  “The paper says they found a piece of hair under her finger nails and are looking at the park’s surveillance camera’s for any suspicious characters that may have been hanging around the park that day or days previous. Oh yes a kid witnessed a man sneaking around the area then positioned himself under the tree, the paper presumes it’s for a better view of people jogging in the park, anyway it also said the kid couldn’t describe the man she saw, interesting. Is it not?”

  “Absolutely, it sure is” he replied having a heart attack on the inside.

  They realized it was getting to 10:00 and that means time for bed, she got up after what seemed to Dominic as an eternity of questionable stares from his wife and kissed him on the lips before announcing.

  “I’m going to bed, are you coming?”

  “In a minute honey”

  She disappeared and came back after an hour in sheer clingy pink negligee and asked again.

  “Are you sure you do not want to come to bed”

  He turned around and stopped short of saying anything, not that his mind would allow him after all that he is emotionally going through, on another night a scene like this would have had his blood boiling. Today is a different story, he muscled the entire surprise look he could manage and whispered with a forced smile dancing on the corner of his lips.

  “You do not have to ask me thrice”

  They made gentle love till they were exhausted and sleep took them over unexpectedly after was.

  He woke up the next day at five-thirty still exhausted from having sex four hours earlier, work did not seem like a good idea and contemplated calling in sick but he thought about what Lily will say and what to do for the rest of the day. Being at work might do the trick of focusing his mind on something else rather than on the woman that look so much like Lily and the police finding him. He was ready by the time Lily woke; the mandatory kiss sent him on his way. At the station he grabbed a metro newspaper and the front page sent another shock wave through his spine, a silhouette of a man he can clearly identify as himself, was on the front page with the heading. GHOST IN THE PARK. The story continued on the forth and fifth pages, he red on standing in the middle of the station hall, at a point he thought again about giving himself up to the police until he red the last statement of the coroner. In the process of cleaning the deceased, the body suddenly became warm and he thought he saw the chest heave. Ether he was disillusioned or something amazing was happening, he wanted a second opinion and left the room to call a colleague but by the time they came back the body was gone, they called the police and the cameras was checked but she was neither seen leaving the room or coming out of the morgue. Another mystery to be solved, the police are looking for the murdered, undead, stolen corpses of the unidentified woman and the ghost in the park. Dominic decided to leave everything to faith and continued on his way to work, his boring life is back to normal.

  3

  GLUTTED WITH DISHONOR

  AT THE SIXTEEN

  The night’s sky is as bright as day (surprising for this time of the year) as the wind gently sweeps through the city centre unnoticed judging by the gloom Scalia Mariette permanently has stamped on his forehead. The city Exuberate and filled with bubbling evening chorus, it did nothing for the state of turmoil his mind is constantly in, he strolled through the streets heading to café de soul in a dark alley just off the commercial district. A vagrant starving and looking worse than any vagrant should, suddenly came out of his hiding place holding a blade in his right hand (somehow an expected product of this city) intending the obvious. Unsurprised Scalia stopped and raised his head, as far as their non-verbal communication went, enough was said and the bum returned to the hole he came from. Café de soul was empty as always, a continues achievement for the bedraggled hole, de soul; he took a sit at the bar, a chair away from an older gentleman probably in his mid sixties and ordered his favorite drink, lemonade on ice. The barman served his drink and went about attending to a lone lady sitting at the other end of the bar, the gentleman emptied his glass and signals to the barman with a finger to bring him another one; he turned to Scalia and said.

  “Mr. Scalia?”

  “Yes” Scalia said dryly without looking at him

  “I’m Michael Thomson, but you can call me Michael”

  “Ok Michael, you called this meeting, what can I do for you?”

  Scalia sneezed twice followed by a loud cough; he looked around the empty café, apologized, and returned to his lemonade on ice.

  “Seems like you have a cold Mr. Scalia”

  “Just Scalia, please”

  “Ok Scalia, you have to take care of yourself”

  “Why don’t we just get straight to business?”

  “That is fine”

  They stopped talking when Michael Thomson’s drink was served then continued.

  “Have you done a job like this before?”

  “If I had, you wouldn’t be here right now”

  “Right Scalia, we want files, I mean a copy of everything the old man has”

  “It’s do-able”

  “Do-able? It should be a walk in the park”

  “Nothing is that easy, here is what I want”

  He handed him a piece of paper, the Gentleman took a look and chuckled.

  “He talked you up but didn’t mention ludicrous in any of his sentences”

  “Do you know what is funny, when I received the invitation note, it didn’t say who talked me up”

  “Ok, bring what you can, two nights from now” he said ignoring his statement

  “Where?”

  “Be patient”

  Scalia poured the last drop of lemonade down his throat and stood up to leave, the man extended his hand for a shake but Scalia looked him in the eye for the first time, revealing the large x scare cutting through the left side of his face and he said.

  “Put that hand away Michael or you might regret it”

  Jean G Pier stared out the Masonic designed window that largely covered one side of his 92nd floor’s office, frail as there can be, one hand on the 1.5 inch thick glass for support and the other unsteadily holding a big tea mug, guarding it to his mouth with much effort after long pauses. A knock at the door disrupted this ritual he’s finding hard to give up despite his condition, the door gently swung open and Scalia dressed in his trade mark black Armani and vintage hat entered, as always he is on time and it is seven o clock sharp. He is the only one that can walk in unannounced into Pier’s offices or home, a privilege he has earned through hard work, show of loyalty and dedication. Pier acknowledged the man he calls his only friend without saying a word and returned his gaze back to the magnificent view that makes up the Chicago skyline. He joined him, hands in both pockets like pier used to do it, for as long as he has known him, which is all of his thirty-five years, when his father use to bring him to meetings, he has witnessed him stand in front of that same window. Coffee mug in hand and a cigarette in the other, having elder a screaming match or quiet conversation with whom ever he had business dealings with at the time. Sometimes they even went to the roof to have business meetings, he definitely likes a few from the top of the world. Things has changed from those days when he had a Michael Corleone type persona and was in charge of the largest construction company in the world, he use to say “Young and wealthy, nothing is above me” Now he is a shadow of his former self. The morning ritual came to an end when the last drop of bl
ack coffee began the process of travelling through his throat to his stomach; a few minutes later, they both exited the formally known as Sears tower, now called the Willis tower, and stepped into a waiting Lincoln town car limo.

  “Mr. White, Trump international please?

  Paul White, his main driver slot the car in gear and eased out onto the road behind a 360 Modena. Not long after, they where at the trump hotel taking their sits at the SIXTEEN, it is Trump hotel’s exceptional, Michelin-rated restaurant located on the 16th floor, the dining’s 30-foot floor-to-ceiling windows that frame a unique vista of Michigan lake, the Wrigley clock tower and the Chicago river fit perfectly with Pier’s view of life and the city. He has frequented the Sixteen since the passing of his lovely wife Katharine eighteen years ago; she left him with the greatest gift a man can ever wish for, a more than lovely twenty years old daughter, Katharine II. Breakfast was nothing short of magnificent, he likes to eat in silence and Scalia did not like breaking tradition but this was too important.