The Penn Friends Series Books 5-8: Penn Friends Boxset

by T H Paul

  “And you aren’t overly suffering because of that?”

  “No,” Penny said, as determined as she could make it sound, though there was a flicker in her eyes, a hesitation that told Thomas all was not as controlled as she might otherwise suggest. There was a battle, no doubt, raging inside his daughter.

  “That’s good to hear,” he said, coldly. It convinced neither of them at that moment.

  “So what do you do for the collective?” Penny said, Thomas taking a sip of his drink which had been dropped in front of him a few seconds before. He placed the mug back on the table, licking his bottom lip as he always used to do, thinking through what he should say. The collective was another code term for the world of Enchanti.

  “I don’t do all that much, Penny. I have no official role.” That was certainly true. The rumours Penny had heard about her father and his fanatics all centred around what otherwise happened behind the scenes, away from Enchanti central council, of which Clarence Aldridge was the elected head. It was common knowledge that Clarence and Thomas had, at times, had very vocal run-ins, though publicly Clarence positively viewed Thomas as a senior member and voice within the collective. He’d just never entirely trusted him enough to recommend him for a role on the council, or so the rumours went. Penny was fast playing catchup with all the politics of her new world of which she had suddenly become a part.

  “But people look up to you.”

  “Some do, yes. Not everyone. They think what I am suggesting goes against everything we are. They don’t understand we are not free until we rid our planet of this parasite. They’ve grown too accustomed to being controlled by it. Not everyone can be as restrained as you are, Penny.”

  She didn’t feel very free or restrained in anything. She let it drop.

  “Tell me,” he said, changing the topic and driving the conversation. “This darkness, the thing you saw at the tanker accident. You physically saw it with your eyes open? It wasn’t something that played out in your mind. You specifically saw it?”

  “Yes, I saw it.” It wasn’t the first time she’d been asked about it, as others on the threads had been probing her a little not long after it had happened. It seemed very few people had ever experienced what she had.

  “Incredible. Do you know what this means?”

  “No,” Penny said, automatically coming in just that bit closer to the table, her voice dropping even quieter. “What does it mean?”

  “It’s exceedingly rare to have seen what you have seen. Few have studied our kind as much as I have,” which Penny knew to be true. Several people had spoken about her father being a leading researcher into Enchanti history. He’d made it his passion learning as much as he could. “As far as I’m aware, it is only about one or two in every three-hundred thousand who have the level of awareness that you have. It’s a gift to be celebrated. You are quite rare, Penny.”

  She couldn’t help but sit a little straighter in her chair after that comment. It indeed explained why she was able to control the cough better than most others were, though even that had not been enough to stop it ruining her life. The reality of her situation pressed in on her again, the momentary happiness of being called special soon weighed down by the guilt she was feeling.

  Penny’s phone rang. It was Clive. Penny nearly jumped at the sight of his name appearing on her display, and cancelled the call as quickly as she could. He would have to wait.

  “What do you think it means?” Penny had been wondering that very thing ever since the incident with the tanker. Why had she seen it? Why did she need to see how it looked? Was it important?

  “I don’t think that matters. Maybe it does. The significant thing for me is what it tells us all about you. You are special.”

  Hearing she was special, even coming from a man she’d loathed for more years than she would care to let on, did something inside of her at that moment. As if knowing hope was rising, however, as if it wanted to make it’s dirty little presence known, her cough kicked in hard, her stomach fully alive, her mind active and ready to pounce.

  Kill him, it said, the first time she’d heard anything come back like that since the fateful night with her mother. Kill him before he kills you. Penny’s hands were beginning to shake noticeably now. Her phone began to ring again. It was Clive.

  “You’d better answer that,” Thomas said, taking in the sudden change, the shaking fingers, the repeat caller.

  “I can’t speak right now,” Penny said, taking the phone to her ear, but with the cafe so crowded, there was nowhere she could otherwise move. Clive could be heard speaking, Thomas able to pick out the odd word. He listened to the word drugs, as well as Clive’s closing comment about coming over later. Thomas kept that knowledge from Penny.

  “Anything urgent?” he asked, Penny's body now clearly showing signs of drug dependency on something. Thomas had seen it dozens of times.

  “No,” Penny said, shoving her phone to one side. “It’s nothing.”

  The pair spoke a little longer, but Thomas knew Penny would soon call time. He was waiting for the inevitable. When it did come just three minutes later, Thomas didn’t object. His daughter was in a mess––not overly so in the present, but he could tell there was a lot he needed to understand. He let her go, saying he would be in touch. Penny raced off. Thomas, however, went to his car. He knew where Penny was heading, and though he wanted to follow, could easily drive himself back to a house he’d once called home.

  It was later that night, parked around the corner so that he was not visible on a street he’d once lived, that Thomas spotted Clive Banks arriving. He knew the man was trouble the moment he’d stepped out of his high priced car. Thomas had waited outside as Clive went into the house. He could only imagine what was happening inside his old home, but had his phone out ready, standing behind a fence, for when Clive emerged back on the driveway. Thomas got a good look at Clive, himself hidden in the shadows but only twenty feet from the man now saying goodbye to his daughter, and Thomas watched him drive away. Thomas had recorded the vehicle registration plates for good measure.

  Thomas left the street seconds after Clive’s car turned the corner. Thomas would get the lowdown on whoever this man was, and if he was the reason behind his daughter’s drug habit, Thomas intended to put a stop to it all.

  3

  Something I don’t tell many people is that between the ages of fifteen and eighteen, and it’s fair to say for every day of those three years, I’ve thought about death.

  Initially, I didn’t know why that was the case. I just assumed it was my teenage hormones kicking in, or a reaction to life around me. I soon labelled it entirely that, in fact. I’d seen one classmate rape another, I’d been the subject of bullies, my dance teacher sexually exploited me, and before any of that crap had come my way, my parents had split.

  Fast forward to the end of the three years––to Penny here in the present––and I can’t say things have vastly improved. I have to work nights for Clive to sustain a drug habit he forced upon me. I see what he has done to me, but I don’t feel strong enough to break it all off. I know I’m not strong enough to do it on my own, yet that is all I have. My father while now hovering at the extremities of my life is a long way from ever having the chance to be an active part. I am still alone.

  Death seemed to follow me around. Of course, now I understood what it was, why these things always seemed to happen to me. Others might see that reality as letting themselves off the hook, but it wasn’t the case for me. I had always been hard on myself. It was all my fault.

  However, death was to continue––I was heading to that inevitable conclusion myself, but it was another’s demise which was to finally shake me from the mire in which I had become entrenched.

  Penny was working the next three nights at the pub now that summer was upon her; besides, she was of adult age and free to work whatever hours she wanted. Over the last months, she could quickly have given up the job altogether. Penny was earning plenty of money
via Clive’s contacts, but Penny knew she couldn’t just quit her regular job, not yet anyhow. People might start asking where she was getting all her money from, if not the pub. Millie would become suspicious, more so than she already was. She still wasn’t allowed back to the bar, despite herself turning eighteen by that point as well. Penny kept expecting her friend’s cheery face to come in through the doors as she once had, but there was no sign of her.

  Also absent was Clive. He was usually reasonably regular, using the pub as an office away from home, though had not shown up on either of the first two nights Penny had been working.

  “You heard from Clive lately?” Penny asked one of the ladies in his usual group, on that third night. Penny had herself been leaving messages for Clive. He’d not returned any, nor called her with clients for a few days. She was starting to run very low on heroin.

  “No, love, I haven’t. He was meant to be here last night.”

  “Have you tried calling?”

  “Left a message earlier today. I've had no reply,” is all the woman said, taking her drink, as Penny moved to serve another customer.

  A couple of minutes later, Penny was talking with the landlord. It was highly possible he’d caught Clive selling drugs or something and barred Clive for good.

  “I’ve not seen Clive Banks around lately. You know why?”

  “Beats me,” he said, calmly and showed signs of recognition that he too hadn’t noticed Clive coming in recently. Penny let it drop. She didn’t sense her boss was holding anything back from her.

  By the end of the night, Penny could overhear a conversation going on within Clive’s group of friends. A few of the guys had been trying to make contact, some laughing that he was probably bunked up with some chick, or catching rays on a beach in Spain, though there was some noted concern starting to show. It wasn’t like Clive to vanish as he had, he wasn’t that kind of bloke. If he were leaving the country, he would have told someone. He would have put a number two in place. Clients were counting on him for service, addicts relying on him for supply.

  Penny walked over to the group as one of the women was on the phone with her boyfriend. She was relaying the call to the others, Penny now standing with them, collecting up the empties from around the table, but apparently listening to the relay.

  “He’s outside Clive’s place now,” she said, her voice elevated, as she narrated what she was being told on the phone. “There’s no answer from the front door. He’s looking through the front window. Nothing,” she said, the group hushed, Penny stopped collecting the glasses altogether as she now couldn’t do it quietly enough. “He’s going around the back; he remembers that Clive kept a spare key for the back door by the pond. He’s found the key, going over to the door now,” she continued to say, before covering the phone so that her comment was for the room and not mistaken as narration. “I hope he doesn’t have an alarm,” but another man present confirmed he knew Clive didn’t have one. A man like Clive didn’t need one. Clive knew all the criminals in a thirty-mile radius. He ran most of them.

  “He’s inside. The kitchen seems tidy,” the woman continued to relay before her boyfriend was heard swearing, loud enough for them all to hear in the gathered huddle in the pub. It didn’t need communicating, instead, the woman spoke back to her boyfriend.

  “What is it, Stu? What’s happened? Is it Clive?”

  There was a reply obviously spoken, though the others could not now hear what was said. However, as the woman was standing there listening, her hand coming up to her open mouth, her eyes full of shock, the atmosphere changed dramatically.

  “Honey, get out of there. Call the bloody police, but you can’t be seen there. Make sure you haven’t left prints. I’m coming right over!” she said, her hand now shaking. She grabbed a chair to steady herself, helped into it by a friend.

  “What is it? What’s happened to Clive?”

  “He’s dead,” she let out, almost in a silent breath, so much that, had everyone not been on tenterhooks, they would have missed it. However, no one missed a word.

  “Dead? How?”

  “I don’t know, but Stu said there was blood everywhere. Somebody had smashed up Clive pretty bad.”

  “Someone did this to him?” The shock was even more significant.

  “I’ve got to go over there,” the woman said who’d been speaking to her boyfriend. A few others agreed to go with her. Penny still had an hour to go on her shift. She said she would stay in touch. All she could think about was how was she now going to get her drugs.

  Police had arrived on the scene within ten minutes of the call. The front and the back door were taped off as neighbours started to come out onto the street, initially hostile that there were coppers on their road––it was that type of area––but the mood changed when Clive’s body was carried out in a black bag just before midnight. A murder investigation was already underway. A team of forensics were going to the house, recording everything they could about what might have happened. A few neighbours were asked questions about what they had seen, as were the group that had turned up from the pub. All would report, however, that they’d seen nothing.

  Given who the victim was––Clive Banks was very much on the Met’s radar, but they hadn’t been able to pin anything on him––it was clear there could be a thousand possible scenarios as to who had got to him. There was no doubt about the crime, however. It was murder. Someone had broken into the home––a side window forced––and Clive had been stabbed to death in his hallway. A full autopsy was scheduled for the following morning, which would give them a few more specifics.

  Penny had joined them all at midnight. She’d finished her shift, and through a few phone calls back and forth, had been caught up with developments. Penny joined the girlfriend of Stu, who was trying to comfort her boyfriend, the man troubled by what he’d walked in on.

  “I mean, it was a mess,” he said, not for the first time. They were standing to one side, speaking in heated whispers so that no one else might overhear. Both had already been questioned by the police, neither had anything to report.

  “They are saying it's murder,” Penny said, having heard someone say that not long after she’d arrived.

  “For sure. Clive had knife wounds all over,” but Stu couldn’t continue, and looked away as the recollection threatened to turn his stomach more than it already had.

  “It’s okay, honey, you don’t need to say anymore. Come on, and I’ll take you home.”

  “We can’t leave,” he protested, but she was having none of it.

  “You can’t be seen here. Come on,” and with that, the woman led her boyfriend to the car. Penny watched them drive away.

  Penny’s hands were trembling, though that had nothing to do with the still warm July night time air. It was in part the situation, though mostly withdrawal. Penny went back to her car. There was nothing she could do, she needed sleep, and she had enough heroin left at home to see her through the night. She would face the dilemma of what she needed to do next, for the morning.

  Penny left the scene without saying anything to anyone. By that point, it was only a few onlookers, most of them locals or immediate neighbours, who were out on the street. A couple of police officers stood guarding the front door, but besides that, there was nothing more to see.

  Penny drove home, with questions now rising in her mind. If someone had known about Clive, did they also know about those he worked with? Did they know about her? She didn’t feel in any danger, though was more watchful than usual as she pulled onto her driveway and switched off the ignition. It was nearly one in the morning by that point. Darkness prevailed, and all her own neighbours were no doubt sound asleep.

  Penny made it indoors without further incident. She decided that she would leave the drugs for now. If it was all she had left, better save it for when she was desperate. She was asleep within minutes.

  4

  Clive’s death was a sudden and unexpected chance to break me from his grip. Th
ere were no longer clients of his whom I had to entertain, nor was there an endless supply of drugs. That first day was brutal. I didn’t leave the house, my body going into shut down, covered in sweat.

  I flushed the remaining drugs that I had left down the toilet on the second day. I knew this was my chance to break free.

  However, I now had little income. The hours at the pub were once more my sole source. At least it was summer. Bills were much lower, and as I’d finished school, I didn’t need to keep buying stuff for that. I’d also purchased plenty of new outfits that previous year to see me through for a while. I’d be okay, I convinced myself. Maybe I’d be able to find a full-time job if I needed to if Uni wasn’t going to be the case.

  Then I reminded myself as if waking up in a cold sweat from a fantasy that I knew could never exist. There was no point me planning so far ahead. Penny Black was not going to be there.

  Penny’s father Thomas was due to meet with his daughter again on that fourth day of going cold turkey, having called up the previous night. Penny was through the worst, and felt somewhat human––somewhat Enchanti––again as she woke and showered. She had agreed on the same cafe as they’d met before.

  Penny walked again, breathing in the fresh new day, her shakes under control, her mind clear for the first time in a long time. She was slowly working herself off drugs. She felt elated.

  Local news had been reporting a little about the Banks murder, and Penny had been watching it with interest for anything she might learn. So far, no clear motive had been found, and there were no obvious suspects. The investigation was ongoing.