Ghosts

by Matt Rogers

  Then he was gone.

  Alexis’ wrist was raw from straining against the handcuff.

  She collapsed against the back of the desk, shut her eyes, and held back tears.

  47

  King waited, and waited, and waited.

  He was about to end the call and ring again when there was a click.

  A gruff raspy voice said, ‘Well, if it isn’t the traitorous dog.’

  King didn’t speak.

  Ray said, ‘You’ve decided to come running back with your tail between your legs?’

  King said, ‘Shut up and listen.’

  Ray froze on the other end. The caller’s voice was very, very different to Alan Ward’s.

  King said, ‘You don’t know me, but I know you. Here’s how this is going to work, and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll soak in every fucking word I say. I know you’ve been calling the DA all day, trying to get out of the mess you’re in. I know she hasn’t been answering your calls, which is quite unlike her. Usually you get top priority. The reason for her radio silence is because I’ve got her tied up in the room next door. Call my bluff if you want — make calls of your own. You’ll find out she hasn’t been seen at work since the early afternoon. You’ll find out half her security made a collective spontaneous trip to the hospital. So there’s that. But it’s your lucky day, Keith. That’s not all. I’ve got someone else you’re very interested in talking to. I’m calling from his phone.’

  Silence.

  King said, ‘Are you interested?’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Did I say you could ask questions?’

  ‘Listen, buddy,’ Ray snarled. ‘If you think—’

  ‘Your back’s to the wall, Keith,’ King said, cutting him off. ‘You’re quickly running out of options. What are you going to do if I turn alive Gloria into dead Gloria? Who’s going to save you from this disaster? Sure, you might win the war with Gates, but then your whole operation is scattered and broken and you’re not going to be able to suppress everything you did today. You know what’ll make it even harder? If I go to every newspaper in Vegas and spill the beans about your special relationship with Armando.’

  There was a pause, then Ray said, ‘How the fuck do you know—’

  ‘Doesn’t matter,’ King said. ‘You in or out?’

  ‘What do you want in return?’

  ‘You have a friend of ours.’

  Silence. Then, ‘That bitch? You’ll swap Kerr and Ward for her? What is she, your squeeze?’

  Slater clenched his fists so hard King thought they might break.

  King said, ‘You say one more word about her and I’ll put a bullet in Gloria’s head and then come for you.’

  Ray laughed, back on the front foot. ‘You come within a mile of this place and I’ll blow her brains all over the wall. You know I will. That’s why you’re calling with the offer. Don’t act like you can push me around. You’re just as desperate as I am.’

  ‘Then we’re in business, aren’t we?’

  A pause, and then, ‘Sounds like we are.’

  ‘I knew you were a rational man.’

  ‘We swap,’ Ray said. ‘Tonight.’

  King could almost hear him daydreaming. Imagining getting Kerr handed back to him, imagining her fixing everything. She could use her authority to quash Gates for good, to suppress any suspicion about Ray’s involvement in criminal activity, get him back to his rightful perch atop the mountain of corruption.

  But he had suspicions.

  Rightly so.

  ‘I know you’re not acting alone,’ Ray said. ‘The girl mentioned there were at least two of you. I know you’ll have a backup shooter somewhere. You think I’m vermin and want me dead. You’re a righteous crusader, aren’t you? That’s not how this is going to go. I’ve got backup shooters of my own. I catch any hint of a trap, she’s dead. Even if you kill me first. I’ll reach up from beyond the grave and pull her down with me. You understand that, buddy?’

  ‘I understand,’ King said. ‘We do this right. We cooperate. And then we go our separate ways.’

  Ray said, ‘Hold on.’

  King paused.

  Ray said, ‘You didn’t deny anything I just said.’

  ‘I didn’t.’

  ‘So you are some crusader,’ Ray said, ‘and you do want me dead.’

  King didn’t answer.

  Ray said, ‘What’s to stop you coming after me? You know, when the dust settles…’

  ‘There are thousands of men like you out there,’ King said. ‘We just want our friend back. That’s it. We’ll find some other trafficker to mess with. You have my word.’

  ‘Find them someplace else,’ Ray said. ‘That’s my only stipulation. Leave Vegas alone. You know it’s the right move. Even if you take care of me, it’ll only create a power vacuum. There’s a dozen people just like me ready to take my place. Or Kerr’s. Do the right thing.’

  ‘I will,’ King said.

  Oh, I will.

  Number one rule in my world: You never put blinkers on.

  Ray said, ‘I’m sure you know where I am. It’s already fortified, so don’t think about storming it. Nine p.m. tonight. Not a minute earlier or later. You drive up in one vehicle with Alan Ward and Gloria Kerr. Just you. No one else.’

  King said, ‘I have a friend with me. She’ll come along to help. I can’t handle two resisting hostages on my own.’

  ‘“She”?’ Ray said. ‘You got a harem going on or something?’

  King masked his disgust.

  King said, ‘Me. My friend. Kerr. Ward. I want you and Alexis out front, and no one else. You don’t need help for one hostage. Keep your boys back inside. I’m sure you’ll want them in the windows with guns on me, but that’s not how this is going to go. Do we have an understanding?’

  ‘We do.’

  ‘I have more men,’ King warned. ‘I’m keeping them back. Don’t get greedy and turn this into a shitstorm because you think I’m an idiot for playing by the rules. Don’t make me send them in.’

  ‘Are you really ex-black ops?’ Ray said. ‘That’s some serious shit.’

  King hesitated. What’s Alexis told him?

  He said, ‘You don’t need to worry about that.’

  Silence.

  King said, ‘One more thing. What have you done to her so far?’

  Ray said, ‘None of your business.’

  ‘You’re interested in self-preservation, Keith,’ King said. ‘You know if I find out anything happened to her the deal is off. You’ll get to kill her, sure, but then you’ll make me and all my friends real angry. You don’t want to do that.’

  Keith said, ‘I haven’t done anything yet.’

  Yet.

  ‘Then you’re not going to lay a finger on her,’ King said. ‘When we get her back, if I hear the slightest hint that you put your hands on her, there’ll be hell to pay.’

  ‘What if she lies?’ Ray said. ‘What if she says I did?’

  ‘She’ll tell the truth,’ King said. ‘We’re not like you.’

  Quiet.

  King said, ‘Nine p.m.’

  He hung up.

  48

  Alexis didn’t hear anything.

  The door was practically soundproof, and when he opened it again she’d managed to regain some semblance of composure. The phone call had lasted ten minutes, fifteen tops. An awful lot of information can be conveyed in fifteen minutes.

  Internally she screamed at herself to stay calm, to not show anything on her face.

  He wants you to be scared.

  That’s what he likes.

  But his face was blank, a world apart from how he’d stepped out. He looked almost forlorn. Maybe the cocaine was wearing off — he might be on the comedown.

  She’d almost resigned herself to being raped.

  The look on his face started to sway her.

  She didn’t allow it to. It was exactly the type of sick game he’d play. Let her think she’d escaped har
m just to take advantage when she was at her most vulnerable.

  To crush her completely.

  He said, ‘It’s your lucky day.’

  She sat rigid.

  He said, ‘If the man upstairs exists, he’s on your side. I’ve just arranged a trade with your friends. They seemed very interested in getting you back.’

  Hope speared through her.

  He took a step forward, reached out a hand, and stroked it through the air inches from her face.

  He half-smiled — sad and pathetic. ‘I’m not allowed to touch you. That was their rule. I’m smart enough to honour it. Here’s the deal. Are you willing to work with me here?’

  She couldn’t have been more confused.

  He looked scared.

  He said, ‘I’m not going to lay a finger on you until the trade. In exchange, I’d like you to forget our little altercation before. I didn’t touch your breasts. I was going to, I know, but that was then. This is now. The circumstances have changed.’

  She rocked back, flabbergasted.

  He said, ‘Will you tell them I’m a man of my word?’

  She wanted to laugh at him. She wanted to spit in his face. She wanted to shout and scream obscenities until the sun rose the next morning. But the reality was she was still handcuffed to a desk, still the prisoner of a coke addict, still well and truly in danger. Ray was practically bipolar in his mood swings — that didn’t mean he wouldn’t swing back again in the other direction.

  She had to keep him placid until King, Slater and Violetta came for her.

  She said, ‘That’s our little secret. As long as nothing happens in future.’

  He nodded. ‘You have my word.’

  She thought, They’ve got you scared, Keith.

  They’ve got you fearing for your fucking life.

  It felt so good.

  He nodded brusquely to her, turned and left her in peace, closing the door behind him. He’d left the lamp on for her. It was luxury compared to the dark. Nothing was worse than the pitch blackness, so total and all-encompassing it had almost crept into her soul. With her free hand she reached up and wiped the smudged mascara off her cheeks. Composing herself.

  The ball’s back in our court.

  More tears wanted to come.

  She didn’t let them out.

  They’d be tears of joy, and she had no reason to celebrate until the trade actually took place, proving it wasn’t a figment of her imagination.

  Trade me for who? she thought.

  Kerr?

  Had they kidnapped the District Attorney?

  She gulped back apprehension.

  Even if she made it out of this godforsaken warehouse, there’d be far-reaching consequences for what they’d already done.

  Vegas had every chance of chewing them up and spitting them out before the night was through.

  49

  A clock above the fridge ticked.

  King cradled a glass.

  Violetta watched him.

  He knew she was judging. He swirled the remnants of whiskey around the bottom of the glass and gulped it back. He didn’t lift his eyes to meet hers. He closed them instead. Felt the warm burn against the back of his throat. Inhaled through his nostrils. Held the breath. Let it out.

  When he opened them, he was calmer.

  She said, ‘Don’t become Will.’

  He looked at her finally, and rolled his eyes. ‘Do I look like I’m becoming Will?’

  They were alone in the kitchen with the overhead light off. The adjacent sitting room had its bulbs blazing, and there was more than enough of it to spill through to the kitchen, half-illuminating them. As it had grown dark outside neither one of them had got up to light the kitchen island. They seemed to mutually agree that the best kind of thinking took place in the shadows.

  Violetta said, ‘You shouldn’t be doing it before an operation. You never used to.’

  ‘It’s one glass,’ he said. ‘I’m steadying my nerves.’

  ‘I’m worried about you.’

  ‘Don’t be.’

  ‘I’m usually not,’ Violetta said. ‘But today…’

  ‘It was intense.’

  ‘What would you have done if you found my body in Kerr’s office?’ she said.

  He stared at her. ‘What’s the point of talking about this?’

  ‘Because,’ she said, ‘I never told you how close it was.’

  He put the empty tumbler down.

  He let her elaborate in her own time.

  She said, ‘I played it off like it was nothing. But I had to take a risk. The sort of risk I’ve never taken before.’

  He said, ‘You were in the field with us in New York. You had a gun to your head in the lobby of our building. Remember?’

  She looked at him. ‘This was closer than that.’

  He went quiet.

  She said, ‘Her enforcers came in. Tony and Eric. Tony put a gun to the back of my head. Kerr had a gun aimed at my face, from the other side of the desk. I started weeping. It made him hesitate for a second. I threw myself to the side. So hard, so fast. I exaggerated it on purpose. To make Kerr jump.’

  She paused.

  She said, ‘Kerr shot Tony in the stomach. Just reflex, nothing else. Her finger pumped the trigger and her aim hadn’t caught up to her intentions so the bullet went straight through the space I used to occupy and into Tony’s gut. He doubled over and I stripped him of his gun and shot him and Eric in the head, then I wheeled to her and had my aim on her before she could aim at me. She was frozen like a statue. She couldn’t believe what she’d done. She wasn’t even thinking about retaliating.’

  King imagined it playing out.

  It would have been close.

  Way too close.

  He said, ‘That’s the job.’

  ‘I’m just saying,’ she said. ‘We both need to be prepared for the day our desperation move doesn’t work.’

  She got off her stool and came to him. He put his arms around her waist, cupping them against the small of her back. She took his face in her hands and kissed him, long and slow.

  When they parted he said, ‘We were never supposed to live cautiously.’

  ‘I’m only wondering if there’s a life outside of this. If we’re still alive in ten, twenty years … do we reconsider?’

  ‘I tried it,’ King said. ‘Trust me, I tried it.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘It’s not for me.’

  ‘Because you lost someone,’ Violetta said. ‘You lost the closest person in your life. That has to tarnish your view of it.’

  ‘Klara was everything to me,’ he admitted. ‘Just like you’re everything to me.’

  ‘So if you lose me? If I lose you?’

  ‘We go on.’

  ‘I don’t know if I could.’

  He kissed her on the forehead. ‘You’re stronger than me. You just haven’t recognised it yet.’

  ‘I’d question everything. If I had to do this without you.’

  ‘It’d be crazy if you didn’t,’ he said. ‘That’s the whole point. We’re supposed to feel these terrible things. You think I’m fearless out there? You think the constant reminder of death isn’t right there on my mind?’

  ‘It never looks like it is.’

  ‘It’s there,’ he said. ‘Everything I do is despite the fear. Not because of the absence of it.’

  She nodded.

  She said, ‘Tonight won’t go according to plan.’

  ‘It never does.’

  ‘I just need to know you’re ready.’

  ‘Always,’ he said. ‘I always expect the worst. That goes hand-in-hand with the fear.’

  She said, ‘Where’s Slater?’

  King said, ‘I think he’s talking to Alan.’

  Violetta stood upright. ‘He shouldn’t be doing that.’

  King said, ‘Wait.’

  She stopped in her tracks.

  He said, ‘Let them speak.’

  ‘What if Will gets angry?’ she
said. ‘What if he snaps?’

  ‘Oh, he’ll get angry,’ King said. ‘But he won’t snap. He’s got more control than you give him credit for.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘When Ward revealed he kidnapped her, Slater already had a gun to his chest. He didn’t fire it.’

  She nodded.

  King said, ‘That was the most fear I felt today. Those few seconds. When I wasn’t sure what he was going to do.’

  She hesitated. ‘Not even when you thought I was dead?’

  King could be honest with her. She’d always told him to hold nothing back.

  He said, ‘If you’d died, you would have died with honour. Fighting against evil like Gloria Kerr. If Slater had pulled that trigger, he would have killed a man simply because he was angry in that moment. A guy who was green to the police force, inexperienced, overwhelmed. A guy who wasn’t evil. Slater would have ruined everything he stood for with one trigger pull.’

  She went quiet.

  She understood.

  She said, ‘Will would have died too. His old self. The moral side of him.’

  King nodded. ‘That’s how ruthless we have to be on ourselves. It’s so easy to make allowances in our minds. We can’t ever let it happen.’

  ‘It’s the noblest pursuit of all, I guess,’ she said. ‘What happens when you’re asked to make a decision you’re not comfortable with to save your own skin?’

  He stared into space, watching the shadows over her shoulder.

  She said, ‘Jason? What then?’

  He turned his attention back to her.

  ‘That’s when,’ he said, ‘we need to be prepared to lose each other.’

  She nodded, went back to him and wrapped her arms around his mid-section.

  Sometimes their world made no sense.

  And sometimes it made perfect sense.

  50

  Slater wasn’t sure what his intentions were.

  Before he could stop himself he went into the office occupied by Alan Ward.

  The cop hadn’t moved — he couldn’t if he wanted to. His wrists and ankles were bound together with cable ties and, for added peace of mind, Slater had used his patented electrical tape cocoon to fix Ward to the armchair beside the desk. The junior officer sat there now, refusing to squirm, refusing to shout for help. He could understand that King and Slater didn’t consider him the enemy — they simply needed him restrained in case he got any rebellious ideas before nine p.m.